


Inches and Falling

by WeAreTheCyclones



Series: Play Crack the Sky [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Rock Band, F/M, Minor Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski, Multi, Overdosing, Rock Stars, Tour Bus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-26
Updated: 2015-01-11
Packaged: 2018-03-03 15:41:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 21,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2856227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WeAreTheCyclones/pseuds/WeAreTheCyclones
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She smiles at Scott just like she smiles at everyone else, but Scott’s the only one on the tour bus who can’t breathe right for minutes afterward. Probably. Most likely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Part 1

**Author's Note:**

> Lol i hate summaries ANYWAY: If you haven't read [Play Crack the Sky](http://archiveofourown.org/works/989786), this will make very little (or no) sense to you. :)
> 
> Warning, there is like VERY LITTLE STILES AND DEREK IN HERE. Veeery little. I mean, they're discussed, but they don't really show up much.
> 
> I've been promising this since the day I posted the last chapter of that big ole monster, so here it is. This is the answer to the "who was Scott sleeping with?" question. And hopefully also provides some insight into Scott's state of mind/point of view for some things as well. I tried to make the sections clear in what they correspond to in Play Crack, but I'll post a quick rundown in the notes at the end for you. :)
> 
> Inches and Falling is a song by The Format!
> 
> (this will probably be two or three parts, depending)

**September, 2015  
Los Angeles**

Allison is on her… fifth cup? No. Sixth cup of coffee today. Eighth if she counts the two she took down at 2am when she gave up on sleeping to handle the mountains of emails haunting her.  
Alright, so eighth cup.

She’s on her eighth cup of coffee and the sun is dipping down over Hollywood outside her windows. The windows she shouldn’t have. She shouldn’t have this office. The other managers in the firm had given her endless shit about it when her father gave it to her in a grand ceremony after Smokes went gold the first time. “Baby’s first corner office,” one of them had said with a smile too saccharine to be authentic…

She hadn’t deserved it then. She didn’t deserve it when she spent most of her time on the road anyway. She doesn’t deserve it now. Especially now.

Her vision is blurring at the edges as she stares at the iMac’s screen and it’s no better when she shifts her eyes to the smaller monitor on its immediate right. It’s no better when she stares out the window and tries to remember the freeways that lead from here to the Argent cabin up in Tahoe. Where she would rather be. Where she might end up after this is all handled and self-sustaining.

She fucked up. She really fucked up. She dropped Stiles off at an outpatient rehab center in Malibu this morning (while clutching her fourth cup of coffee). “Make me proud,” she’d said, forcing a smile. He looked at her with a level of exhaustion she’d never seen in him, emotionless, and waved over his shoulder as he was led away. 

And she hadn’t seen the others in a week. Not since the last media training session, through which all three of them stared back at her petulantly in a closed off way Allison had never been on the receiving end of until they were dismissed. They left without a word. Well, Isaac gave her a small, comforting smile and squeezed her hand. But other than that. Silence.

She had visited Stiles as much as she could. In between calling upon owed favors and fielding inquiries from the press and writing releases and sitting through meetings the band wasn’t even aware of. When she knew the rest of them couldn’t possibly be around. (She had maybe called ahead of time, from the curb just outside the parking garage, to see if he had any visitors... but that was only after she stopped by to drop off flowers and heard Scott and Lydia coming down the hall. She almost hadn’t made it out of that one.)

Honestly, that probably hadn’t helped her position with the band, but it did help her professionalism. 

Which is what she told herself when she didn’t want to face that she was just… afraid. Ashamed. Sorry. She wasn’t ready to be hated by them and not seeing them kept the illusion alive.  
She swallows the dregs of her eighth cup with a grimace and pushes the mug away. She taps her fingers against the edge of her keyboard in thought.

“ _Mr. Stilinski is not available for interview at this time. He is under strict orders from_ ” blinking cursor… Allison can’t remember the name of the guy they’d settled on… He had owed her father a favor for something… Allison can’t remember that detail either. 

And she’s furious. She’s wired and tired and furious. She’s seconds from ripping her hair out, but her hand closes around the cool glass of a paperweight, a hunk of heavy glass with a guitar and “Mama’s Little Rocker” etched into it. Before she can pick it up and hurl it at the fucking windows she didn’t earn, her door swings open.

“Where have you been?” Scott asks, voice steeped in simmering fury as he stops directly in front of her desk and puts his hands on his hips.

Allison stares at him with what she hopes is a cool, unsurprised expression as she willfully releases the blunt object.

“Scott,” she greets, voice level. 

“Where have you been?” he repeats, just as harshly as before. “We needed you.” Accusatory, angry, a tad south of hateful… “I can’t fucking believe you.”

He sets into a pacing pattern and Allison watches, feeling seasick. “You’re just in here fucking working, like… you’re just doing fucking desk work.”

She raises an eyebrow and unclenches her jaw to speak. “Yes… what am I supposed to be doing?”

“You just dropped Stiles, our Stiles, off at _rehab_ this morning and now you’re sitting here fucking… filing or whatever like it’s no big fucking deal and you know what? It’s a huge fucking deal, okay?”

Allison hasn’t filed a damn thing since college, that’s what interns are for, but she doesn’t say that. And of course it’s a huge fucking deal, that’s why there’s a stack of signed NDA’s _unfiled_ and sitting on her desk. That’s why she hasn’t really slept since she was woken up by Scott’s phone call a week before the tour was supposed to end. She doesn’t say that either. 

“And on my way over here, KROQ said something about a statement released today about how Stiles is on the road to recovery and it had you all over it.” He says it disdainfully, with an edge of unreasonableness…

“Yes, Scott, that’s probably because I wrote it,” she finally snaps. 

“You’re just so fucking unemotional about this and it’s your fucking fault!” He stops pacing right in front of her desk and Allison sees the tears pooling in his eyes for the first time. The hard shell she’d been working on since he walked in crumbles. 

“I’m not unemotional about this!” 

She isn’t. She might seem it, but she isn’t. When the car door shut and the driver pulled away, Allison instantly started crying. She sobbed the entire way back to the office and tipped the driver generously when he let her continue to sob fifteen minutes after he had pulled into the parking structure without saying a word. She’d fixed her makeup in the bathroom on the first floor, shoved sunglasses onto her face and marched right to coffee number five before tackling the next task on the list. 

“Yeah, bull-fucking-shit, Allison.”

“Do you want me weeping on the floor or making sure your career stays afloat?” she asks in a cold tone. 

“I want you to be the manager we signed up with,” he bites back.

“What are you doing here, Scott?” she sighs, rubbing her temples and slumping in her chair.

He gives a furious shake of the head and looks toward the windows at dusky Hollywood. “I got in my car and ended up here,” he says through a clenched jaw. He leaves it at that. 

Allison takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. Stiles’ hospital isn’t far from here. According to the visitor information Allison had conned out of the nurses, this was around the time Scott usually dropped by. 

She looks up at him finally and sees the second the fight flies out of him. His shoulders slump right before he drags himself to the chair.

“I’m unemotional because I have to be,” she says softly. “I have to see this through to the end. I have to make sure there are no possible leaks. I have to make sure the story checks out 100% with no room for doubt… I can’t be emotional.”

He’s staring intently at his own hands but he nods.

She wants to get up and hug him, but she turns back to her email instead. Dr. Nathaniel Keyes. Her father’s best friend from undergrad, owed him a favor when the Argent lawyers took on a case for him against a pharmaceutical company. She types out the rest of the email while Scott pulls himself back together.

“We needed you,” he says finally. 

She flicks her eyes toward him and then back to the second monitor where a constant stream of news stories keeps popping up, all of them citing the press release she sent out earlier that morning. So far, not a single drop of suspicion has edged its way into the conversation…

“I was here.” She meant it in a “I was _here for you_ ” kind of way, but judging by Scott’s scoff he took it in a “I was in the office staying the hell away from that shit” kind of way. So she tries to salvage it with: “I’m doing this all for you guys, all this bullshit… this is for you guys.”

“For our career.”

“Yes.”

“What about us?”

She slumps in her chair and rubs her hands over her face, makeup be damned. “What do you mean what about you? This is for you.”

“So we’re just cash cows to you—“

“Don’t you fucking dare,” Allison says, forcing her body to lean forward, forcing her voice to get dangerous. The accusation echoes through her, stings like an open-palmed slap to the face. 

“You didn’t go see him, not even once,” he says, voice shaking. “You just picked him up and dropped him off at that shithole and now you’re right back here…”

Allison grabs her mug, gets up and walks past Scott toward the coffee maker on the other side of the office. She pours the rest of the pot, a lukewarm half-cup or so of tar, and drowns it in sugar to make it drinkable. “I did go see him,” she says while she stirs, her back to Scott. 

“When?” he challenges.

She strides back to her desk and sits, places her hand on her mouse and opens the top story on the feed to look like she’s actually doing something. So she doesn’t have to look at him when she says, “Every day.”

There’s stunned silence on the other side of the desk and she reads the same sentence over and over again. “ _With a successful surgery behind him, Stilinski is on the road to a quick recovery. With a successful surgery behind him, Stilinski… With a successful surgery behind him, with a, with a…_ ”

“Every day?” Scott finally asks. 

Allison clenches her jaw and blinks against her swimming vision and forces a small nod. 

He didn’t talk for the first two days. The doctor told her he couldn’t talk, something about tubes down his throat and such having left his voice raw. Vocal rest. She knew better than anyone that Stiles didn’t give a fuck about vocal rests. “He told me to tell you that,” the doctor admitted at the beginning of the second day. Of course he had. 

The first thing he had said to Allison was on the third day: “I love you.” And then he cried. She held him to her like she’d been wanting to for months. For as long as she’d been scared for him.

Allison didn’t have any siblings, but the way she feels about these kids… that must be what it’s like. The horror she felt when she got the call from a frantic Scott was something she’d never quite felt before. Never wanted to feel again. And seeing Stiles small and pale and stuck with IVs and shivering through withdrawal in a hospital bed… 

When she first met Stiles Stilinski, she had that same feeling she got when her father had introduced her to some of the biggest rock stars on the planet. He had something in him that they had. Charisma, energy, confidence, talent. And seeing him in a hospital bed, well… he had that part in him too. That addictive personality, that darkness, that self-destruction. And she hadn’t done a thing to stop it. She just pushed him and pushed him from tour stop to tour stop, praying that he’d make it through. And he didn’t. And that was her fault.

“I’m sorry,” Allison whispers when she can, still not looking at Scott.

“It’s not your fault,” he says immediately, exhaustion edging into his voice. 

“I should have done something before it got to this.”

“We all should have.”

“But I’m your manager, it’s my job to keep you all safe.”

“Fuck that. We’re all his family and we all fucked up.”

She looks at him, notes the bags under his eyes and the resigned sorrow etched into his features. It’s kind of nice to hear it that way. It’s nice to be considered family. 

“I wish I could have been there with you guys,” she says to shift the topic away from blame to save them both.

“I wish you could have been too.”

She gets the sense that she doesn’t need to explain herself so she doesn’t. “I’ve missed you.”

“We’ve missed you too.”

They let the moment hang between them. Scott goes back to staring at his hands for awhile before he sniffles and clears his throat. Allison looks back at her screen.

“It’s going to be okay, you know,” Allison says, putting her computer to sleep. She sees him nodding in her peripheral vision. “Where’s Lydia? You two should take a trip somewhere. I can handle travel arrangements, just let me know.”

“She’s not talking to anyone, but I think she’s back home.”

Allison’s heart clenches. She takes a second to breathe before she stands and starts shoving things into her purse. “I’ll call her.”

“Thank you,” Scott says, voice wavering. 

She pauses and looks up at him to check in. He looks lost.

When Allison first met Scott McCall, she was laughing in seconds. He had jumped onto Stiles’ back and kissed him on the side of the head while Stiles grinned. She felt like she’d known him for years after about fifteen minutes worth of conversation. Stiles looked at him with reverence. Lydia lost her intimidating edge when Scott was around to tease her. Derek actually loosened up. Touring with them only cemented what Allison had assumed to start with: Scott was the glue. It was impossible to make him uncomfortable. He slipped seamlessly into any group of people and never left a tour stop without making new friends. He was never lost. He was never uncertain. He was the bravest and most loving person she had ever known.

And now his best friend was in rehab, his sister isolated hundreds of miles away, Isaac in Chicago. He’d been the one to find Stiles and the one to call the ambulance and now he is losing it.

Scott slowly pulls himself to his feet, seeming like his whole body is a burden to him. She finishes shoving her portfolio into her bag, walks around her desk and pulls him into a hug. He melts into it, his head dropping to her shoulder. They stand there for awhile, quiet and unmoving. 

Allison’s eyes rest on the platinum records on her wall and the framed pictures of them… her kids, her band. One of Allison with Lydia’s head in her lap, one of Scott and Stiles carrying Allison away from the bus, one of Isaac and Allison singing karaoke at a bar somewhere in St. Louis… She nuzzles against the side of Scott’s head and he squeezes her. 

“Come over, we’ll order food and watch terrible TV,” she says after pulling away. 

“Okay.”

She wasn’t aware she was afraid of rejection until relief washes over her. She grins at him despite herself. He smiles back, at about half the wattage she’s used to. But it’s something. She drinks the rest of coffee cup number nine, grimaces worse than with number eight and leads Scott out of her office.

She calls Lydia on the way back to her place and the first thing she says when she answers is: “I love you.” 

**

**August 4th, 2016  
New York City**

“Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck,” Allison curses, frantic. Lydia’s wide-eyed and chewing her thumb next to her, her phone in her other hand as she tries to get through to him. “What the fuck is wrong with him? Please be okay, God, please…” She’s not talking to anyone in particular.

Scott’s shaking as he sends a few text messages in a row pretty much expressing the same sentiment.

“Can’t you track his phone?” Isaac asks, breaking through the panicked atmosphere with his cool logic.

“Fuck!” Allison exclaims, pulling her laptop out of her bag. Scott, Lydia and Isaac crowd around behind her. When his phone comes up on the map not too far from where they are, Allison’s not exactly relieved. Neither is Scott. “Fuck.” She slumps back in her chair. She takes a second to breathe before she’s back on her feet and reaching for her things. 

“Where are you going?” Lydia asks, hot on her heels. 

“To get him.”

“We’re going with you,” Scott tells her, gathering his stuff too.

“No. Just… go out. Enjoy your night.” And then she’s gone before they can even argue.

Scott looks between Isaac and Lydia and sees worry on both of their faces. If Stiles isn’t okay…

“He’s fine,” Lydia decides. “He’s been fine for ages, he’s fine.”

“And uh… Derek’s waiting.” Isaac scratches the back of his head. There’s an unspoken “now we don’t have to figure out how to handle this” attached at the end. Because yeah, sure, Stiles being there is no longer an issue. But… “Allison is handling it, she’ll let us know how it goes.”

He’s right.

“Scott…” Lydia says, grabbing him by the wrists to get him to look at her. “It’s fine. He’s fine.”

He believes her a little better this time.

“Okay.”

“And if he isn’t, we’ll leave.” 

“Okay.”

Scott has a low-grade panic attack for the next twenty minutes anyway.

They get a text from Allison just as their cab pulls up to the curb outside the club where they’re meeting Derek. Scott holds his breath to check it. “He’s fine. Going back to the hotel. Have fun, be good.” And then he exhales slowly. He texts her a quick thank you and she answers with a heart emoji.

They go inside and order strong drinks and stake out a spot big enough for them and the roadies once they’re done at the venue. Before Derek has even arrived, a beautiful drag queen slithers into Isaac’s lap. Lydia and Isaac love it, Lydia pulls her phone out to take pictures and Isaac hams it up for the camera. Isaac doesn’t even flinch when the drag queen grabs him by the face and smacks a wet, red-lipsticky kiss right on his lips. Scott just pulls out his phone to text Stiles again so he doesn’t feel totally terrible about him not being here. So he doesn’t feel entirely eaten up with guilt. So he has some reason to let Stiles know he’s glad he’s okay. And then he just settles on: “We killed it tonight, bro. See you tomorrow.” Scott’s hand shakes as he slides his phone back into his pocket.

“Oh my god,” Lydia says, shining eyes trained over Scott’s head. She grins and the tears start flowing as she jumps to her feet. Scott almost doesn’t want to turn around, almost wants to just get up and leave to go watch Netflix with Stiles in his hotel room instead but then Derek is suddenly there and Lydia is hanging from his neck, face buried against him and wow… wow it is good to see him, actually. 

It shouldn’t be. Scott had gone from missing him like crazy to borderline resenting him to outright hating him as he watched Stiles deteriorate. He’d become the caricature of an evil villain in his head for awhile there. He doesn’t even know when he just started missing him again, but he had. He had felt it when Derek had called Lydia and he’s feeling it even worse now. 

Scott’s on his feet and hugging Derek the second Lydia releases him. 

“I’m surprised you wanted to see me,” Derek admits awhile later when they’re all pretty close to, if not actually, drunk. He doesn’t elaborate. He hasn’t said Stiles’ name or alluded to him at all and he won’t. Scott knows he won’t, knows he shouldn’t.

“Of course I did, you’re my brother,” Scott answers, throwing an arm around his shoulders. 

What would Scott even tell him if he did bring Stiles up? That once Derek left, Stiles spiraled out of control and landed himself in rehab not even a year ago? That Stiles had disappeared after the show tonight and everyone was worried that he would end up dead somewhere? That this worry just so happened to correspond with Derek’s presence in the city? That Scott was battling with himself for being happy to see Derek when Stiles was back at the hotel by himself? No good could come from it.

When they part ways, Derek hugs all of them for a long time, whispers something in Lydia’s ear that makes her sniffle, tells Scott to keep in touch and tell Allison he says hi, ruffles Isaac’s hair…

They all agree not to tell Allison that they saw Derek because they’re definitely not prepared for that fallout.

**

**August 7th, 2016  
Philadelphia, PA**

She smiles at Scott just like she smiles at everyone else, but Scott’s the only one on the tour bus who can’t breathe right for minutes afterward. Probably. Most likely.

“’Morning,” she says, lifting her mug up to inhale the steam. “How’d you sleep?”

“Fine,” Scott answers, way too tired to keep the dopey smile off his face. “You?”

“Fine.” She pours the rest of the coffee in the pot into a mug and hands it to him. “Oh, uh, what would you say to doing a club tour before Europe?”

“Sure.” 

“Cool. We’ll all talk details later once I know whether or not everyone’s on board. If anyone needs me, I’ll be inside.” She gives him a little wave and walks toward the front of the bus. “Oh, and make more coffee before Lydia gets up, you know how she is.” And with a twinkly smile, she’s gone.

Scott runs his free hand through his disastrous bed-head and feels the distinct swooping sensation and pounding heart that Allison always gives him. 

“Yeah, you know how I am,” Lydia grumbles from the open door to the bunks. She yawns and stretches and shuffles toward him. She waits for the door to click shut behind her before leveling Scott with a scrutinizing gaze. “Are you ever going to do anything about that?”

“About what?” Scott asks, shoving his mug into Lydia’s hand so he can busy himself with the coffee pot.

Lydia accepts the mug but watches him intently over the brim as she takes a drink. “This whole Allison crush thing.”

“I don’t have a crush on Allison.”

She rolls her eyes. “You so do.”

“She’s our manager.”

“You’ve been totally outright flirting with her forever and then lately, nothing. You just get all blushy and weird every once in awhile or you just _stare_ at her sometimes like she’s a piece of art or something.”

“She’s Allison,” Scott scoffs, as if that’ll carry enough weight to shut this down.

“Exactly. She’s gorgeous and amazing and cool and powerful and already our best friend and everything Scott McCall looks for and fails to find in the girls he usually goes for.”

“Ouch, Lyds.”

“It’s okay to have a crush on her is all I’m saying.” She gives him a gentle, loving smile before taking another sip. “You two would look cute together,” she adds. Scott definitely blushes.

“Sure,” Scott mumble, sarcastic.

“What do you mean sure? It could totally happen.”

“Number one, what have we learned about dating people on tour with us?” 

Lydia throws her entire head into that eyeroll.

“Number two, Allison is going to end up marrying the CEO of some giant corporation and will someday be able to literally buy a country to run as her own or something, she is absolutely not going to stoop down to my level—“

“And what level is that? A famous rock star stud muffin like you? C’mon. You’re a catch, Mr. McCall.”

Scott shakes his head, biting down the grin Lydia is gunning for. 

“I’d date you,” she says innocently.

“Ew, no you wouldn’t.”

She crinkles her nose. “Yeah, I wouldn’t. But! I can see why people would and I totally support it.”

“Thanks, Lydia.”

“Any time, pumpkin.” She kisses him on the cheek and heads off the bus, probably to go bother her tech, and Scott is left sort of blushing and sort of hopeful in the kitchenette by himself.

**

**August 11th, 2016  
St. Louis, MO**

Allison gets to the venue before the bus does and opts to sit on the loading dock with the truck crew in the cool early morning air. Apparently Indy hadn’t gone well. Apparently the band seemed off. Apparently Allison should never leave again. (This last message was delivered with a sweet grin and a hair ruffling from the driver. Allison ruffled his hair back.)

The first member of Smokes she sees is Scott, who gives her a soft-eyed smile that makes her chest do something stupid.

“So I heard last night sucked,” she says when he approaches her. No one else makes a move to step off the bus once the driver disembarks, so the rest of them must be asleep still.

He shrugs. “Off nights happen.”

She raises an eyebrow. 

“Okay, so it was a really, really off night. And it’s not like the fans noticed, it was just…” he makes a vague gesture. “Technically bad.”

She “hm”s disapprovingly but lets it go. “Everything okay?”

He does his puppy-dog grin thing and nods. Her stomach twists. 

“Because Felipe told me you guys have been weird. Weird like how I left you or weirder?”

“Felipe!” Scott exclaims, looking toward the truck driver.

“What, man?”

“Stop selling us out!”

“I can’t lie to the boss lady!”

“You’re a weak man, Felipe.”

“She’s got those dimples, Scott.”

“I know,” Scott concedes with a sigh. Allison isn’t blushing, absolutely not. “Fire Felipe,” Scott says with a charming smirk.

“I’ll fire you before I fire Felipe.”

“Aw, you don’t mean that.”

“Why are you guys being weird?” she asks, still definitely totally not blushing in the face of Scott’s bed-head and shining Disney prince eyes.

He shrugs. “We missed you too much?”

“Stop.”

He shrugs again, but his face closes down with it. 

“Are you mad at Stiles?” she prompts.

He shrugs.

“Is Stiles mad at you?”

“I don’t know.”

“So why are you mad at Stiles?”

“I’m not mad.”

“Then what are you?”

“Frustrated.”

“About?”

He huffs in annoyance. “Nothing, drop it.” She stares at him with as much intensity as she can muster. He doesn’t break.

“Am I going to have a shit-show to handle once everyone is awake?” she asks, suspicious.

“No.”

“Am I going to have a shit-show to handle in the near future?”

“No.”

She doesn’t believe him. 

**

**August 14th, 2016  
Chicago, IL**

This more than qualifies as a shit-show. This is a shit-spectacular. A shit-extravaganza. A shit-festival.

“Well, that was a mess,” Allison says, hand plastered to her forehead, her bangs sticking up. Scott’s still trying to calm himself down. Stiles is in his bunk, Isaac is up front with Boyd, Lydia is rubbing her temples on the other side of Allison… yeah, mess. Understatement. There are no words for this. 

“It would have been nice to know that you all had gone and met up with Derek, by the way,” Allison says, every syllable a struggle. Everyone in the fucking universe is giving her shit about getting Smokes to sign a new contract but they don’t understand that this band is falling apart a little more every single goddamn day and not even she fully grasps it.

“We just… I just wanted to see him and he called so…” Lydia starts, her voice steady even though she sounds uncertain.

“You don’t have to explain yourselves,” Allison cuts her off. She gets it. She misses him too. They’re silent for awhile before she sighs. “How is he?” she asks in a small voice.

“He’s okay,” Scott answers, the first thing he’s said since letting it slip that he wanted a break.

“Good to hear…”

“He misses you,” Lydia adds meekly. 

Allison nods for awhile, eyes focused on a spot on the floor. One thing keeps echoing in her head: “ _It’s almost like you’re using again_.” That and the way Stiles recoiled from it. And the way Allison’s stomach twisted because what if he was? What if she hadn’t noticed again? What if he was in trouble? And what if this Derek thing sets him over the edge? “ _It’s almost like you’re using again… It’s almost like you’re using again…_ ”

“Do you really think he’s using again?” she asks, looking up toward Scott. 

“I don’t know.”

“No,” Lydia says more firmly. “He wouldn’t…”

“You know… that was really wrong what you said to him,” Allison says, her voice stronger than before. “How… how dare you say that…” her voice is shaking now. She lets out a cruel laugh. “Shiny new post-treatment Stiles… fuck. Scott, that was… so cruel. I expected better from you. Do you have any idea how hard he’s trying? And then you just… you just go and say something like that as if it’s a fucking ace up your sleeve just to win a goddamn argument… wow.” 

She buries her face in her hands and tries to reconcile Scott McCall with a version of himself that actually thinks it’s okay to do that to a person, his best friend. 

“I fucked up,” Scott says so quietly she almost misses it. 

“Yeah you did.”

“But I’m sick of playing second fiddle to him while he self-destructs. I shouldn’t have said what I said, but I shouldn’t have to have _my life_ upset by his stupid choices and his hurt feelings. He’s the lead singer, not my fucking boss. If I want to see someone, I’ll see them. I don’t care how he feels about it.”

“Is that what this is?” Allison asks, slightly surprised that… it makes perfect sense, actually. Sadly. 

Scott nods and she sees the guilt in it, but he doesn’t waver. Scott had been so there for Stiles. Scott had dragged him away from parties, spent time sobering him up in bathrooms before shows, called the ambulance, sat with him every day in his hospital room, visited him in rehab, spent most of his nights at Stiles’ place after he was discharged to cook for him and play video games with him… He’d done a lot. A lot of self-less, difficult things… and he was tired. So Allison nods back.

Lydia huffs. “We take care of each other, that’s what we do—“

“And you don’t think I’ve done my fucking part?” Scott snaps, riled up as he turns toward her. “You don’t think I put in my goddamn time? I am so fucking tired of—“

“Shut up, stop,” Allison commands and Scott actually listens. Lydia sighs. “Let’s just stop talking about it and get to Milwaukee and just drop it, alright?” Allison burrows into the couch and crosses her arms resolutely.

Lydia gets up and slinks back out to the bunks or the front lounge or wherever and Scott continues to simmer beside her.

“I’m not a terrible person, am I?” Scott asks after awhile.

“No.”

“Because I kind of feel like a terrible person but I’m also really mad so…”

“Then just… be mad.”

Scott falls over onto his side and buries his face in the couch cushions and Allison hears a muffled, drawn out groan coming from his side of the lounge but she doesn’t rise to it. When he sits back up, she looks over at him.

“Do you really want a break?” she asks.

“Yeah, I do.”

“For… a month? A year? Forever? How long?”

His inability to answer is what kills her.

**

**August 19th, 2016.  
Wichita, KS.**

“You’re better than this.” Allison says, looking up from her laptop while Scott drags his feet back onto the bus just before sunrise. He can still feel some other girl’s skin under his fingertips. He can still remember her perfume. But the image fades when he looks at Ally.

“Better than what?” he asks.

“This whole… sleeping around and getting starry-eyed over every girl shtick.”

There’s a twinge of hurt at that. “I don’t get starry-eyed,” he argues. 

And who fucking cares, honestly? That’s not even what it is. It’s an elaborate rouse. It’s some fucking game he can’t stop playing. He isn’t looking for anything, he’s playing pretend for a night. So are they. 

No one says anything when it’s Lydia or Stiles or Isaac fucking around. 

She shakes her head and sighs. “Whatever.”

“Not whatever. What’s this about? I can sleep with whoever I want.”

“Yeah, you can.”

“Are you jealous?” he asks, hoping she is. Her cheeks flush a little.

“I just think you need to treat yourself better.”

“I don’t see you having these conversations with the others.”

She looks around them in the empty lounge. “I don’t see anyone else here witnessing this, do you? You have no idea what I talk to the others about.”

Good point. 

“Your attitude has been really shitty lately, you know?” she continues. 

Yeah, he does. He’s tired. And he’s sick of living on a tour bus. And he and Stiles aren’t talking and he doesn’t exactly want to talk to him anyway, not that he’s here to talk to anyway because he’s suddenly too good for tour buses… And he’s sick of cheap fucks when someone like Allison is just… there reminding him of everything he doesn’t have. And honestly he shouldn’t even be thinking like that while his idiot best friend is getting worse and worse every day and rather than just being worried, it’s just making him angry…

“I’m sorry,” he says. And maybe it’s because he’s exhausted, but he can’t help but say: “The only girl I want is so far out of my league we’re not even playing the same game.”

(He pictures himself juggling knives, each one representative of a different problem. This is one of those knives. He practically holds his breath as it falls…)

Her eyes widen and then her whole face softens. “Well, if she’s making you lovesick then she’s the luckiest girl in the world.”

“What do you mean?” (He catches it and flips it back into the air…)

She smiles. “I’d be honored to have a guy like you pining for me.”

God dammit. “Right.” He rolls his eyes for good measure and goes to poke at the coffee pot. 

Allison reaches out and grabs his hand as he passes and he stops. “It’s going to be fine,” she tells him.

“Sure, I’ll just fuck around until I forget about her, right?” Scott teases, even though it hurts.

“No, you should just go for it. You’re a catch.”

He can envision Lydia smirking about this. Scott stupidly weaves his fingers through Allison’s and just holds her hand for a second. Pretending. He’s just pretending that he’s allowed to do this. He’s just pretending she doesn’t see it as a friendly gesture. And she’s not pretending anything.

**

**August 23rd, 2016.  
Las Vegas, NV.**

Allison leans against a road case backstage and answers emails on her phone while the band plays to a rowdy crowd. 

“They’re amazing,” Kira gushes, her lips close to Allison’s ear.

“Uh huh.”

“They’ll never go for an indie.”

Allison shrugs.

“Seriously, they’re… huge, they’re way too big for my little vanity project.”

“Don’t call it a vanity project,” Allison argues back, looking up with a creased brow.

“Why not? That’s what my parents call it.”

“Because they’re wrong. Because your mom’s just mad you turned down a spot in her office and she’ll get over it when she sees just how good you’re going to be. Because this is a passion project and not a vanity project. And you could absolutely handle them.” She waves vaguely toward the stage with the last sentence. She looks back at her phone and scrolls through a sales report.

“They’re like real rock stars…”

“You’ve met cooler rock stars than these losers,” Allison says even though she can’t fight down a proud smirk.

“I know! That’s why it’s weird that I’m so star struck!”

“Once you meet them, the illusion will be shattered.”

“Oh, I don’t… I don’t want to meet them. Not tonight.”

“Huh? Why not? C’mon, you could help me convince them to give a fuck about their expiring contract.”

She shakes her head. “Not the right timing, I don’t even have an office space yet, I am so far from ready to even think about it.”

“At least get your name in their heads.”

She shakes her head in a very final way and Allison shakes her head back, disapproving. 

“So which one is the one you like?” Kira asks, smirking devilishly.

“What do you mean?” Allison counters, trying to sound bored.

“You told me you were interested in someone and you’re never not on tour so it haaaas to be someone on tour with you, so… which one is it? You’re too buddy buddy with the crew and the twins are too young and wow is Boyd into Erica, so that leaves them. Which one?”

“None of them,” Allison says, thankful that the dark of backstage keeps her blush all to herself.

“Stiles doesn’t seem your type, I feel like he’s more of a little brother to you…” She’s not wrong, but Allison refuses to react. “And… hm… I mean, I’m pretty sure you’ve ruled out girls after college, but… Lydia’s a babe…” 

Allison tries not to react but ends up laughing and shaking her head.

“Alright, so… Isaac is a contender, but I don’t know, he looks too much like that frat boy you dated so…. So that leaves… Scott? It’s totally Scott. Clear as day, totally Scott.” Kira grins and crosses her arms over her chest, proud of herself. Allison’s blush deepens. “No, this makes perfect sense. I support it, he’s very cute.”

“Then you can have him.”

“No, I’m not talking to him, remember? He’s all yours. He seems like the type who would worship the ground you walk on. Total catch.”

“Yeah, well, he doesn’t.”

“Psh, even I worship the ground you walk on. Of course he does. You should go for it.”

“He’s hung up on some girl.”

“Which girl? I’ll fight her.” Kira bounces on her feet and smiles.

Allison shrugs. 

“So you like him. What’s the story?” 

Allison doesn’t remember confirming it, but Kira just knows anyway so… 

“He’s the nicest person in the world, he’s hot, he’s talented, he’s charming, what else is there to say?” Allison says with a series of nervous shrugs.

Kira shrugs too. “That seems to cover the bases.”

“Yeah and I can’t even begin to explain how complicated it is or all the reasons why it’s not even an option at this point.”

Kira doesn’t press the issue for the rest of the set. When they duck backstage before going back out for encore, she melts into the background to avoid them. Scott presses a sloppy kiss to Allison’s forehead when he passes and she can just _feel_ Kira’s grin somewhere. Once they run back out, she reappears. 

“Don’t,” Allison warns. “He always does that.”

“Wasn’t going to say anything. I’m going to go, I’ll see you soon. Keep me posted.”

“Yeah, if I can get them to talk to each other we’ll see—“

“Yeah yeah, that but also…” She wiggles her eyebrows and makes a kissy face. Allison groans and pulls her into a hug before pushing her toward the exit.

**

**August 24th, 2016.  
Beacon Hills, CA.**

Beacon Hills is the kind of place that Allison doesn’t understand but wishes she did. She looks around and sees clusters of people who have known each other for decades, arms around each other while they catch up and encourage each other to keep drinking. She weaves through them and imagines she’s from their world… Lacrosse games on the weekends, bonfires, small town shit, whatever. 

Hey, it bred people like Scott McCall and the whole band seems happier here than they have in a long time so it can’t be too bad. He beams at her from across the room and she heads straight for him.

“Having fun?” he asks, snaking his arm around her shoulder in a friendly gesture. 

“Yeah,” she says, smiling. And she is. She thinks it’s nice that hometown shows are like a reunion for them and a celebration for the town. It’s quaint and adorable. “You?”

He turns his head so his mouth is closer to her ear. “Better now,” he says, squeezing her. She feels her cheeks flush.

“What was wrong with it before?” she teases, angling her body toward him, touching his chest with one hand. His arm slips from her shoulders to her waist.

“For a second there, I was the prettiest one in the room,” he says very seriously. “And I just don’t like that kind of attention. But now that you’re here, I’m much more comfortable.” She rolls her eyes but… the delivery sort of works for her. She lets Scott drag her closer. He kisses her cheek and it’s different than it usually is… she feels heat spreading through her, starting from the points where she’s connected to him and spreading outward. She’s just tipsy enough to be courageous and she really sort of wants to maybe kiss him.

“Upstairs,” she mumbles into his ear despite her better judgment.

“Upstairs?” he asks, surprised.

“Upstairs,” she confirms, pulling away from him entirely to take a couple steps away. He follows without a second thought, a look of wonder on his face.

No sooner than he’s closed a bedroom door behind them, Allison backs him up against it. “You’re killing me,” she says, nose touching his. He has his hands on her hips instantly. 

“Me? I’m killing you?” he asks, pulling her closer.

She nods, biting her lip while staring at his. Lydia’s father had her trying out his Scotch collection not too long ago and she’s feeling the results, she really can’t help but look at what she wants to look at. She presses her hands against Scott’s chest. 

She tilts her head just enough to kiss him so lightly he could pretend it didn’t even happen if he wanted to… but he kisses back. Something in her reminds her of the trail of girls Scott McCall has left behind, all the little hairline fissures in his heart left by all of them… she doesn’t want to be another one… So she pulls away totally. His hands fall from her as she walks backward and wipes her mouth.

“No, I’m sorry,” she says no matter how much she doesn’t want to. “I’m so sorry, I can’t…”

“Why?” he asks, sounding devastated. “Why not?”

“Because…” Because I’m your manager. Because I’m not a super model or actress or singer or whatever. Because I’m not prepared to be just another minor love in Scott McCall’s life. 

“Because you’re too good for me?” he asks, voice sounding broken.

“How on earth am I too good for you?” 

He’s blushing furiously and she swears she’s watching his heart break right in front of her and she has no idea why.

“You’re Allison Argent, you’re… amazing, you’re… god, you’re smart and you’re so pretty it’s unreal and you’re… too good for me, that’s why? You just are. You’re so far out of my league—“

“That we’re not even playing the same game?” she finishes, remembering a conversation not too long ago and the feeling that’s dawning on her hasn’t been named yet… “You…? Was that about me?”

He forces himself to nod, hand going to the door handle behind him. “I’d appreciate it if you just… didn’t… if you just let me get over it, I just…” he stutters, humiliated and refusing to make eye contact.

Allison has him back up against that door in seconds flat. He opens his mouth in surprise and she takes the opportunity to kiss him as deeply as she possibly can.

His hands fit on her waist like they were meant to be there when he finally grabs her. He’s soft and gentle and… and if he kisses all the girls like this… Allison just wants to touch him. All of him. She just wants to smooth her hands over his cheeks and through his hair and she wants him to hold her and it’s just so much to take in. She doesn’t even realize she’s moving until the back of her knees hit the edge of the bed. Scott pulls away to sit and she’s instantly in his lap, kissing him again because those couple of seconds without it were too long…

Scott can’t get up and sneak out on her in the mornings, he can’t crawl back to his bus and drive away while his heart aches and while she wakes up alone already missing him… “Don’t break my heart, Scott McCall,” she whispers against his lips. She blames that on the Scotch, absolutely.

“I won’t,” he says back, and she believes him. She pulls away to look at him. He reaches up to smooth her hair away from her forehead and he grins that Scott McCall grin and she can’t help but smile back. “I’m not going to have sex with you,” he says.

Her face falls and she’s almost embarrassed. “Why not?”

He falls back against the mattress, taking her with him as she yelps. “You’re drunk.”

“No I’m not.” She sits up so she’s above him and crosses her arms.

“Okay, then… because we just kissed for the first time and that’s moving it a little fast, isn’t it?”

Allison bites down a grin. “That didn’t seem to bother you with the other girls—“

“You’re not other girls.”

She rolls her eyes at that and tries to dismount him. She’s half free when she starts ranting. “Don’t give me that bullshit, those other girls wanted what they got and I want it too, so don’t even try to play the chivalrous card with me—“

He catches her by the wrist and pulls her down onto the bed beside him. “I’m not being chivalrous, I’m just saying no.”

She shuts her mouth so fast and hard that her teeth click. He pulls her against him and kisses her slowly before grinning again.

“Don’t break my heart, Allison Argent,” he whispers, one hand trailing up and down her arm.

“We’ll see about that,” she teases, cupping his cheek. She uses the close proximity to get a really good look at him – the bags under his eyes that give way to almost invisible freckles across his cheek bones, his long lashes and warm chocolate brown eyes, his gentle smile… And then she dips forward and kisses him and marvels at how stupidly right it feels.

**

**August 25th, 2016  
Beacon Hills, CA**

“There he is,” his mom says when he finally gets downstairs sometime past noon. She’s still in pajamas and house slippers though, so she’s one to talk.

He rubs his eyes and shuffles his feet all the way into the kitchen and kisses his mom on the cheek before rummaging through cupboards.

“How’s your head?” she asks, motherly concern hidden somewhere under the dry sarcasm.

“Aw, c’mon, mom. I’m not even hung over.”

“Really?”

“Really!”

She looks him over and shrugs. “Have fun last night?”

“Yeah,” he says through a gigantic grin. 

“Oooh, I don’t want to know, do I?”

“Everything was PG-13, tops.”

“I’m sure I still don’t want to know.” She pries the pancake mix he hadn’t even realized that he’d grabbed from his hands and starts pulling other things out of the cupboard. His mom is the best.

“Allison likes me.”

She smiles as she measures out the mix and shakes her head fondly. “Of course she does.”

“Like… she really likes me.”

“Okay, now we’re veering into that PG-13, mama doesn’t want to hear it territory, aren’t we?”

“We just made out but like she really likes me.”

She turns away from the mixing bowl, puts her hands on Scott’s cheeks and gives his head a wiggle. “Of course she does, I told you not to sell yourself short.” She kisses him on the forehead and pats his cheeks before slipping around him to dig through a drawer. “You’re on egg duty, my little rock star.”

Scott scrambles eggs while he tells his mom all about Allison’s smile and the funny things she’d said in the last week and it’s nice to actually be able to gush out loud. His mom “mhmm”s in all the right places and rolls her eyes and “aw”s in equal measure. 

When they sit down to eat, his mom clears her throat in an authoritative way before saying, “I’ve always liked her.” She then nods approvingly at how his eggs turned out, and gives him a sparkly-eyed smile and kicks his foot under the table. 

“Good, because I’m going to marry her some day,” Scott says, knowing he’s being hyperbolic but sort of believing in it at the same time.

**

**October 6th, 2016  
Austin, TX**

“You’re such a jerk,” Allison hisses the second Scott opens the door to her pounding. He barely has time to move aside before she barrels into the room. “It’s like we’re not allowed to have nice things. It’s like… it’s almost like you’re all self-sabotaging yourselves and we’re just destined to fail. One good day, one shitty day. Isaac’s taking a break, but hey Derek can come. The band gets along for a minute and then the lead singer and the guitarist are yelling at each other backstage the next. I have no idea where Stiles even is but he made it very clear that it was none of my fucking business, he almost shut my hand in a car window, you know? I hate you guys, I hate all of you. You’re all assholes. But you, Scott, you are the biggest asshole sometimes. What was the fucking point--? No, you know, I don’t want to know. The less I know, the better.” 

She stops to catch her breath and Scott almost says something, but she holds up a threatening finger and slams her luggage onto the floor.

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“But he—“

“He gave Isaac shit for fucking up something stupid, you assumed he was being cocky about Derek, he told you to fuck off, and then that happened. That’s it. That’s the story.”

“Okay, then why are you here? To yell?” Scott should be more fearful of the glare she gives him than he is, but…

“Yes, actually.”

“Okay.”

She opens her mouth and then shuts it. Frowns. And then crumples into an arm chair. “I’m going to fucking lose it,” she mutters.

“I’m sorry.”

She waves him off.

“Do you hate me?” he asks, falling to his knees and shuffling the few feet to her. He stops when he can put his hands on her knees. She looks down at him with a haughty expression that melts away when he kisses the denim stretched across inside of her knee. She rolls her eyes and smiles, runs a hand through his hair.

“I hate all of you guys, remember?” she says, the barest hint of a laugh in her voice.

“But you don’t hate me more than them?”

“I hate you all equally.”

Scott smiles. “It’ll be okay,” he says.

She nods. Every time they say that to each other, the answer is more uncertain. That’s not lost on Scott. They’re holding their collective breath. All the time. Scott doesn’t even know what he wants anymore outside of this girl who keeps dragging her hand through his hair. her fingernails gently scratching his scalp. He’s tempted to fall asleep with his head against her leg up until she stops, skates her hand down his cheek and to his chin. 

“Distract me?” she murmurs, tilting his head up toward her. 

He rises on his knees instantly and lets himself be led into a kiss. He lets her lead until she makes a breathy noise against his lips and then he grips her knees on either side of him and pulls, hoists her up as he staggers to his feet and backs up until he can safely fall into bed with her. 

His phone digs into his lower back but he ignores it in favor of Allison laughing against his neck as her hands slip under his shirt. She’s shoving it up, tracing her fingers along the ridges of his abs, when his phone rings. Scott wriggles until he gets his hand around it, denies the call and tosses it aside. Allison’s tongue in his mouth is better than any conversation anyone could possibly want to have right now…

And then it rings again. Scott can’t reach it to silence it so they ignore it. And then it rings again. And again. Allison pulls away and reaches for it. “Answer it,” she says, pressing it into his chest without looking. She crawls off of him and ducks into the bathroom.

“What?” Scott snaps when he answers.

“Scoottttyyyy,” Stiles slurs. “Come get me.”

“Call Lydia.”

“Scotty, c’mon. I love you more than like…” In the ensuing pause, Scott listens to the ambient sounds of a bar playing loud country music. “More than like almost anything, I was going to say anything but do you remember that ramen place by your house? Like that… that is amazing, I love that more than… anyway I have nooo idea where I am.”

“Call. Lydia.” Scott shouldn’t be angry. He shouldn’t be. He should be worried. He should be scrambling for his shoes and calling a cab and tracking Stiles’ phone. 

“Please, Scotty, I know you hate me. I know you do, I do.” Oh god, he’s sounding teary. “You hate me and that’s like… I get it, I do, I hate me too, but I love you so much, please?”

“I’ll call Lydia,” Scott says and hangs up to dial Lydia before Stiles can start calling back. He tells her to go get Stiles, carefully evades her questions about why he can’t do it and hangs up.

“Who was it?” Allison asks from the bathroom, face still wet and shining from having scrubbed off her makeup. 

“No one.”

She lets it go and starts going through her things. “Pick the shittiest thing you can find on TV, I’m getting changed.” She hugs her clothes to her chest and grins before heading back to the bathroom. 

She falls asleep not half an hour into the most surreal made for TV movie Scott could find, her hand twisted up in the hem of Scott’s shirt and her face pressed into his shoulder. He waits for Lydia’s text before even thinking about going to sleep himself.

Finally it comes: “He’s fine and fuck you so much, Scott.”

“I owe you,” Scott taps out and his chest feels hollow. 

“Fuck you.”

**

**October 12th, 2016  
Los Angeles, CA**

“I think Lydia knows,” Allison says, eyeing her phone before slipping it into her purse. 

“Why?”

“She just asked me if I wanted to come over for drinks with her and Derek and I said I had a date and she said, “That’s what Scott said too…” So… She probably knows, right?”

Scott shrugs. Allison shrugs back and smiles. Scott tugs her into a hug.

“Hi,” he says, pulling back just enough to smile at her. He tucks an errant strand of hair behind her ear and kisses her nose.

“Hey.”

“You look perfect.” 

“You too.”

“Almost like today wasn’t awful.”

She laughs.”It could have been worse.”

Scott agrees, releasing her from the hug so he can take her hand. “It’s good to see him, right?” Scott asks. He’d seen the way her face lit up when Derek walked into her office. 

“Yeah, it really is,” she freely admits, knocking him gently with her elbow as they walk. 

She doesn’t say anything else because they’d agreed to leave business out of this while they could. Being back in LA, pre-tour was one of the few times they could get away with not thinking about the ball of tension they’d be dragging all the way to Europe. Soon enough, they’d be in the thick of rehearsals and preparations and then they’d be on a plane and then they’d just be doing it live and praying that Stiles and Derek didn’t kill each other, or the people in their surrounding blast radius. So for now. Date night.

“Where are we going?” she asks after a couple blocks of companionable silence.

“Mini golf.”

“Mini golf?”

“Yes.”

“Amazing,” she giggles. “I saw a bar a block back, should we be drunk for this?”

“That’s the after-party, Ally, c’mon. Alcohol messes with your game.”

“Alright, I’m sorry I suggested it.”

“There’s a lot at stake here.”

“Is there?”

“I need to know what I’m getting into, how much training I’m going to have to sponsor. Gone are the days of shacking up with women without knowing how they handle mini golf, Allison. You should never sleep with someone you’ve never played mini golf with, what if they’re sore losers or like the worst winners? I’m being responsible. I am a new man. This is very serious, why are you laughing?”

She stops walking just as the entrance to the course and pulls him by the face into a sweet, loving kiss that makes Scott kinda go weak in the knees. “I’m a mini golf champion, you’ve made a mistake,” she whispers against his laugh before pulling away to skip ahead of him.

He catches her around the waist before she can pay for their games and thrusts his credit card toward the kid working. “All I’ve ever wanted is a girl who can kick my ass at mini golf,” Scott mumbles against the side of her head while she pouts.

“Well then, you’ve found her.”

**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sept 2015  
> Post-OD
> 
> Aug 4th  
> Stiles disappears after Madison Square Garden
> 
> Aug 7th  
> Right before the awkward Stiles and Scott conversation where Stiles says he wants to buy a place in BH
> 
> Aug 11th  
> After Cleveland, one of the first clear instances of Scott and Stiles being on the outs.
> 
> Aug 14th  
> After the fight that comes after Stiles discovering that they'd seen Derek in NYC, when Scott says he wants a break.
> 
> Aug 19th  
> Consider this a bonus scene? From when Stiles is flying from tour stop to tour stop and no one is really talking. 
> 
> Aug 23rd  
> Also a bonus scene? The show before the hometown show, surprise Kira.
> 
> Aug 24th/25th  
> While Stiles and Danny were hooking up after the hometown show >:3 and then some Mama McCall stuff because <3
> 
> Oct 6th  
> After Stiles has asked Derek to come back, during the club tour. Stiles gets drunk as hell and gets saved by Lydia. This is what Scott was up to. (And no, Allison is not ever aware that this happened or she'd be furious at both of them.)
> 
> October 12th  
> The date night Scott disappears to after Derek's first day in LA. :)


	2. Part 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like last time, a little Play Crack guide/breakdown thing at the end! <33

**October 18th, 2016  
Stockholm, Sweden**

“Up,” Allison commands at the same time as she opens Scott’s curtain with a furious swipe of her arm.

He startles and blinks at her, face scrunched. “Huh?”

“I said UP.”

“Ally, c’mon…”

“We have to talk.”

“Now?” he asks, whining.

She shoots him a look that wakes him right the fuck up and has him tumbling somewhat gracelessly from his bunk. She waits for him to pull a shirt on and marches him to the back lounge, slamming the sliding door shut behind them.

“What the fuck was that?” she asks, trying to keep her voice level.

He yawns. “Can we do this later?”

“No.”

He’s about to argue but withers under her piercing glare. “Alright.”

“Explain yourself.”

She’d been too livid to even look at him the night before, and she doesn’t feel much less livid now. He looks like he’s being inconvenienced and it takes everything in her not to stomp out.

Scott’s head drops against the back of the couch and he looks up at her with a pained expression. “I just wanted to liven things up.”

“You don’t do that. You don’t get to spring impromptu little stunts on your band or on your support crew.”

“Lydia gave me this talk last night.”

“And now I’m giving it to you and you’re going to fucking listen.”

He nods.

“If Derek quits, we’re fucked. If Jackson quits, we’re fucked. If Stiles quits, we’re fucked. Do you understand? We’re running a tight ship here and I need everyone on board, there is not a single expendable person on this tour. First rule of a happy tour is not purposefully making other people’s jobs more difficult.”

He doesn’t argue. So she continues.

“And with the band in the state that it is, you really thought it’d be a good idea to just… tempt fate? To give Stiles more to struggle with? To drive you both even further apart? To pit him and Derek against each other? What? What’s the point? I don’t understand. He’s your best friend, allegedly, and you sold him the hell out.” He opens his mouth to dispute that but she barrels on. “You sold him out for a cheap thrill. For a fucking crowd pleasing four minute long song. You’ve been friends for twenty years. Stiles would never do that to you. Grow the hell up, be a professional, be a good person, finish the tour without fucking anyone over and then let’s worry about putting this band to rest. Then and only then, not now. That’s it.”

She turns on her heel to stomp away but he has the audacity to say a soft, urgent little, “Ally, wait.” So she does.

“I lost him, didn’t I?” he asks, sounding small.

Allison sighs, tension bleeding out of her only to be replaced with… sadness. “I don’t think so.”

“He hates me.”

“Right now, probably.”

“I mean, for good.”

She remembers Stiles’ impassioned speech back in Salt Lake. “He could never hate you.”

Scott looks so miserable she almost feels bad for him. “Don’t you want to know why I did it?”

Allison shrugs. “You just said. To liven it up. For the fans,” she quotes lamely.

“For them. To make it feel less… shitty. I was just caught up… I don’t know. That was always their song even before we all knew why it was their song and I know Stiles hates singing it with me—“

“He hates it in general,” Allison cuts in the second she sees his confidence dipping below the acceptable threshold.

“Right, but…”

“He doesn’t hate singing with you.”

“I know he doesn’t, but… I don’t know. I don’t know why I did it. I just wanted to see what would happen.”

“What’d you expect?”

He shrugs and seems to melt even further into the couch. “The chemistry’s still there, isn’t it?” he asks, sounding cautiously thoughtful.

Allison doesn’t nod or verbally agree but he lets out a satisfied hmm as if she had. Because it was. Anyone could see that. Everyone did see that. Even though Allison had been busy melting down, she still caught bits of the stage as she paced in its direction, hands fisted in her hair. And for as bad as she knew the nuclear fallout was going to be, they did… sound good together. The energy was there and alive. It worked out. Sort of.

“Don’t do it again,” Allison says, resigned as she throws herself down onto the couch next to him.

“I won’t.”

His head finds his way to her shoulder and she reaches for his hand to hold it loosely. “You guys love each other so much,” she mumbles.

Scott doesn’t say anything. He just stares ahead and thinks.

“He said he was all in with you until death, you know?”

“When?” Scott asks, voice hardly above a whisper.

“Salt Lake.”

“So, before...”

She rolls her eyes. “Well, stop antagonizing him then.”

He huffs.

“You know who my favorite member of this band is?” she asks, infusing as much sugar into her voice as she can.

“You can’t have favorites.”

“It’s Lydia.”

“What? Not fair!”

“It’s so Lydia. Lydia never gives me problems, Lydia and I can share clothes, Lydia never has horrible scandals I need to cover up, she never fucks other people over…”

“Lydia never kisses you either,” he says softly.

“You don’t know that,” Allison taunts.

She feels sort of bad for the grin she delivers right after, as if she should be somber and serious but it’s hard now that the anger she had felt has melted into something softer and sadder. She’s never been good at this part, the professional distance thing. Either too much or too little. But as much as Scott fucked up and as angry as Stiles is, she loves them. She enjoys them. She understands them. She believes in them. So she’ll smile even when she shouldn’t.

**

**October 20th, 2016  
Amsterdam**

The walls in the hotel are paper thin. Scott lies awake listening to his neighbors on the right watching a movie in a language he can’t quite identify. Feeling like an asshole for regretting how the night went. Feeling totally marooned in his empty hotel room.

Allison hadn’t gone out with them, which Scott assumes is going to be the norm for this tour just like the last one. Which sucks. She hadn’t answered her phone when Scott tried to see if she was down for company when he got back. Which also sucks. And she hadn’t really been talking to him much after Oslo anyway. He was pretty sure she wasn’t actively furious with him anymore, but she still wasn’t happy with him. Scott wasn’t happy with himself either. And all of that sucks the most.

Stiles has been a wreck since Oslo. In a quiet way. He hardly spoke, he hardly showed his face outside of necessity, he brought the show in Stockholm to a screeching halt when he refused to play Girl, he phoned it in for Copenhagen and he disappeared from the group the second they got to the club. He had a simmering, horrifying intensity about him that made Scott think way too much of the previous summer and it had his stomach in knots. Not that he’d admit to it. Not that he’d act on it. He doesn't have the energy.

And of course that makes him feel bad too.

Going out after the show really didn't help. He drank and danced with Derek, Lydia, the kids from Royales and the rest of the crew. Derek abruptly disappeared at some point. And after a long time of empty entertainment they dragged themselves back to the hotel. Minus Derek and Stiles, who were nowhere to be found. Which felt familiar, but didn’t make any sense whatsoever.

(They had texted Derek to see where he was, he said he was back at the hotel. They had texted Stiles, he said, “I’m fine.” and left it at that.)

And now it’s hours later and Scott’s ears are still ringing but not loud enough to block out the sounds filtering in from other rooms. Stiles’ room must be empty, unless he’s already asleep. Scott had put his ear to the wall when he first got back just to see. He’s not proud of that.

Because he could have just… knocked. And if Stiles was in there and asleep, maybe he would only be a little mad but at least Scott would have concrete proof that he was fine. Or, maybe he’d have been awake and they would have fallen into some easy conversation and… it would have been good. Maybe.

Scott rolls onto his side and squints against his phone’s bright screen. It’s almost 4:30, there isn’t even a point in trying to sleep now with bus call only a few hours away. He hears two sets of footsteps in the hallway, the first sound out there in a couple hours. They stop just before getting to Scott’s room and a door clicks unlocked and swings open and shut.

Stiles. And someone else. Of course.

He’s about to regret these thin walls when he hears the distant rumbling of Stiles’ rough voice and a smoother male voice responding. More footsteps, the bed creaking, more footsteps and talking for awhile, the bed creaking again… and then silence.

Scott wakes up to his alarm what feels like seconds later and drags himself out of bed. He takes a quick shower and packs up his things. He’s halfway to the elevator when he meets Boyd in the hall.

“Can you get Derek on your way out?” Boyd asks. “Second floor.”

But Derek doesn’t answer when Scott knocks. He calls Boyd to let him know but Boyd tells him not to worry about it.

On the bus, Stiles looks worse than he had the day before. And Derek looks exhausted. Scott tries not to jump to any conclusions.

 

**

**October 23rd, 2016  
London, UK**

Scott can’t really figure out what to call how he feels right now. Equal parts amused, concerned, loving. He takes Stiles’ hand into his carefully and watches as he takes the shot Scott had poured for him.

“Stiles defended my honor,” he tells his mom. She lets out a miniscule scoff and lets it go. She launches into nurse mode without any further questions.

Scott does his best to be gentle with Stiles’ hand, but Stiles just props his head up and lets his eyes slip closed. He bites down a smile the entire time he follows his mom’s instructions. 

Scott sort of can’t wait to tell this story to their kids someday. Amongst others. He doesn’t want to live in a world where they don’t all grow old together. Or a world where he doesn’t have to make a phone call to his mom at least once a tour for someone. Or a world where he and Stiles aren’t talking, which… is exactly the world he’d been living in.

Scott feels a stab of guilt when he squeezes Stiles’ knuckle and tears spring up in his eyes. He finishes his inspection quickly, gets off the phone with his mom, lets Stiles’ hand go, takes a swig of tequila, and pours Stiles another shot. His best friend’s eyes are still shining so he drags him into a meaningful, grateful, long overdue hug.

This whole distance thing doesn’t work for him. He doesn’t feel any better stepping back to let Stiles go at it alone than he did when he was involved. He doesn’t feel any better not talking to him out of spite or watching him float off to sea. He’d rather they be in each other’s pockets all the time. He’d rather be attached at the hip. It’s worked for a long time, why shouldn’t it keep working?

**

Allison is genuinely furious, she really is. Famous people punching people in foreign countries is generally frowned upon for a lot of reasons. Allison is not amused.

But it is sort of nice to see them all in one room giggling together. Like, all of them. On the same bed. They’d been in various states of sprawled out sleep when Scott had let her in (after he had wisely decided it’d be best to text Allison and let her know about their night’s adventure before she had to find out from an outside source). Now they were sitting neatly in a row on the foot of the bed looking up at her like mischievous school children.

Her mischievous school children.

She lets them know she’s disappointed in them before she grabs the room service menu and starts ordering breakfast, at least.

She commandeers Stiles’ bed, only allowing Lydia to join her, and observes the room. Scott leans against the chair Stiles is in and their conversation seems to be flowing easily. Scott feels her eyes on him and gives her a small, private smile before turning back to him. When Stiles throws his head back and actually laughs, his good hand reaching out to punch Scott’s shoulder, Allison feels like something untangles. Derek’s stretched out on the floor with his eyes closed and Lydia’s reading a magazine like it’s an easy Sunday morning in bed. For the first time in a long time, Allison isn’t that worried. From where she’s sitting, it looks like they might make it out of this alive.

**

**October 28th, 2016.  
Belfast, Northern Ireland**

Allison watches Royales from the balcony while they stand around on stage for light focus. They’re singing an approximation of a song they heard on the radio back in Copenhagen that’s been stuck in their head since. Allison is impressed by how all three of them have somehow naturally settled on the same sets of made up words. She laughs as the twins look to each other before launching into some sort of simple choreography. Erica bounces her hair back and forth, inexpertly singing the made up gibberish with more enthusiasm than before.

“What are they doing?” Scott asks, leaning against the balcony railing next to Allison.

“It’s their light focus routine. That was on the radio in the car in Copenhagen. Or… well, a song that sounds like that. And they’ve been developing it into this whole thing. Apparently there’s dancing now.”

Scott nods, also impressed, and watches. “They’re good kids,” he says after awhile.

Allison nods.

They are. They’re really good. Pleasant to work with, unscathed, eager, harmonious. They’re totally different from how Smokes is now and Allison is a different manager with them, but it’s a nice fit

“Things are really good, aren’t they?” he asks.

She smiles. “Yeah, seems like it.”

Scott and Stiles have been friendly since London, Derek has settled in more and Lydia is happier. Allison is happier. The crew is happier, though they’d been pretty untouched by the band’s little drama… but Allison can see the whole circus coming together naturally, comfortably… and it’s been good for everyone. The shows have been better, the fan reactions have been even more positive… Allison can work with this. She can maybe get them to think about contracts if things keep going this well.

Scott bumps her with his hip and she turns to look at him. He’s smiling at her a little shyly and she realizes then, in the urge to cup his cheeks and kiss him, that she hasn’t spent a lot of time with him in the past week.

“I miss you,” Scott says.

“You’ve been having too much fun with your band to miss me.” She shifts closer so she can elbow him.

He shifts closer so he can snake an arm around her waist. “No one in my band kisses me so…”

“Stiles probably would,” Allison teases.

“He probably would,” Scott agrees, his face drawing closer to hers, a pretty smile curling his lips as he tilts his head a little. “I should go ask him then…”

“Derek might get jealous, they’ve got that whole weird ex vibe going on,” Allison counters.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t get jealous?”

Allison closes the distance between them for a quick kiss and pulls back to smile against his cheek.

Later, after both bands are sound checked and ready to go, Erica smirks at Allison, lifts a perfectly sculpted eyebrow and gestures toward Scott with a nod.

“You saw?” Allison asks, fighting down a nervous laugh.

“I saw nothing, my lips are sealed.” And then she bounces away.

**

**November 1st, 2016  
Paris, France**

“Why didn’t you come with us?” Scott asks when Allison looks up at him from the couch.

She shrugs. “I’m tired. Wasn’t feeling up to a La Bete event. Why are you back already?”

The lights in the suite’s living room are dim, a fancy scented candle is lit, the fireplace is on. Allison is stretched out with her laptop, looking as close to relaxed as possible. Scott feels sweaty and a little under the influence and a little sad still.

“You weren’t there.”

Allison’s eyebrows rise. “Really?”

Scott sits on the coffee table directly in front of her, takes her laptop and sets it down next to him. “I like you a lot.”

That shocks a smile out of her. “I like you a lot t—“ He presses his lips to hers before she can fully pronounce the last syllable.

She laughs a little but melts into it easily, her hands coming up to rest on his neck. She pulls him closer until he’s forced to kneel on the floor.

“Wait,” she says, slipping a finger in between their lips. “What about the others? Should we… relocate?”

“Lydia’ll be back in the morning,” Scott says. He can practically read her mind: _but we have press tomorrow morning_. “It’s Lydia, she’s never been late,” he adds when Allison looks concerned. “And the other two are still at the party. I think. I don’t know, I haven’t seen them in awhile but it took a long time to track Lydia down too.”

Allison rolls her eyes and pulls away from him entirely to lean back against the couch. Scott scrambles to sit next to her, pulling at her hand until she falls against his shoulder. Her slender fingers curl around his and she smells good and god, she’s pretty.

“Tell me a story,” she requests, sounding inches away from sleep.

“What kind of story?”

“Any kind. Make something up.”

Scott is halfway through a story about a werewolf high school student playing basketball when she laughs and pinches his side.

“Are you really just telling me the plot of Teen Wolf?”

“I was going to call it Adolescent Canine, actually.”

She curls further into him and he feels her mouth on his neck. “You’re perfect,” she mumbles.

She lifts the hand he’s not holding from his side up to his chest and he takes it as an invitation to lay back, pulling her with him.

“You don’t smell great,” Allison says after while, a smile in her voice.

“Yeah, well, you smell good enough for the both of us. And it’s your turn for a story.”

She settles into talking about an ill-fated camping trip with her family and one of her father’s biggest clients. It ends with, “And that’s how I almost ended the career of one of the world’s most influential rock bands when I was ten years old.”

“When you almost shot the lead singer with a bow and arrow,” Scott clarifies, amused and in awe.

“When he wasn’t following safety precautions and almost walked in between me and a hay bale. In hindsight, he was probably on something.”

“If you had killed him, would you still be our manager?”

Allison stifles her laughter against Scott’s chest. Scott buries his nose in Allison’s curls and laughs too.

“It’s a serious question!” he urges.

“Too many unknown variables. Would his estate have pressed charges? How would the investigation go? Would my father have lost the client—“

“Would he have lost the band after you killed their lead singer? Probably.”

“Probably, but maybe not!”

They argue through a long list of what ifs until they fall asleep. Scott wakes up with his phone goes off and the sun is filtering in through the open windows. Allison lifts her head from his chest and squints around.

“I left my key, let me in,” Lydia says the second he answers.

“Coming,” Scott mutters, rubbing his face.

“Shit, are Derek and Stiles back? Did they see us?” Allison asks, climbing off the couch and knocking over the lamp on the end table. Scott trips over an ottoman on his way to the door, he shrugs and waves for Allison to disappear into her room.

“Did you sleep on the couch?” Lydia asks when he opens the door.

“Uh, yeah.”

“Does Stiles have someone here?”

“I don’t… think so? Is he back?”

“He wasn’t at the house.”

“Huh…”

“Is Derek back?”

“I don’t know?”

“He also wasn’t at the house.”

“You’re really awake right now,” Scott groans, rubbing his eyes. She smirks in a way that tells Scott exactly why she’s so energized and he crinkles his nose against the thought. “Keep it to yourself.”

“Help me find my key?” she asks, pouting. “Allison will kill me if I lost it, she hates when we lose the keys.” When he doesn’t protest, she drags him behind her into his room.

He finds Lydia’s key card in a pile of dresses at the foot of her bed and flicks it at her. “There. Go shower, you look like a floozy,” he says, teasing.

“Mmm, I am,” she murmurs, a satisfied smirk on her face. “And you smell terrible, go fix that.”

Scott slips into his and Stiles’ room quietly and is relieved to see him peacefully asleep. He gathers his shit, showers and heads back out to the living room where Derek’s rubbing his head and clutching a coffee mug.

“When did you get back?” Scott asks, trying to sound casual even though his heart is pounding.

“Uh… late?” Derek answers, not quite meeting his eyes. Shit.

“How late?”

“I don’t know, um… late.”

“Oh.”

“When did you?” he asks with a nervous glance toward Scott and Stiles’ door.

“Also late.”

“Did you sleep on the couch?” Derek asks.

“Yeah, fell asleep out here.”

Okay, so Derek didn’t see him and Allison… So when did he get home?

“Oh.” Derek casts another look at Stiles’ door. “Was Stiles with someone?” Derek asks, cheeks reddening a little.

Oh. Scott tries not to react to that at all. He still has no idea what’s up with Stiles and Derek and he’s not about to try to figure it out now. “I didn’t even make it to the room, I just knocked out.”

He visibly relaxes. “Yeah, long night, right? Fun though.”

“Yeah, it was,” he says, trying not to sound too dreamy about it.

**

**November 5th, 2016  
Berlin, Germany**

Allison absolutely doesn’t smirk when Derek and Stiles stagger their entrances to breakfast. It’s a close thing, but she doesn’t. No one else is suspicious. Not even Scott, which is funny considering he’d theorized that they had disappeared to go “give each other blow jobs in the alley like the good ole days” the night before.

They probably had.

Anyway, Allison is reading a lengthy email from her father on her phone while the eggs and bacon on her plate get colder and colder. She’s too tired of this shit to be irritated. Even with him telling her that she’s being immature with her career and that of “everyone in the Smokes For Harris camp” by not forcing them to face their responsibilities. Even with him telling her she “needs to grow up” and stop playing “free-spirited groupie” with her band. Even with the PDF of marketing analysis and sales projections and blah blah blah that marketing had already sent her and that he’d already sent her several times. As if she hasn’t read it. As if she doesn’t know that the band is in prime position for wild growth in the next couple of years if they just keep it together. She knows. She’s the one who sees them on stage every night. Of course she knows.

She deletes his email without responding and goes back to the inbox. There are so many things that need to be answered and dealt with that she’s not entirely sure what to do with. Performance requests. PR things. Merchandising. Post-tour strategies. The label asking where the band’s head is at with the new terms included in the draft of the theoretical new contract they’d sent while they were in London.

And in between all that, almost lost in the sea of red high-priority exclamation points on everything else, is an email from the real estate agent in charge of selling Stiles’ house. That she can deal with.

“Oh, Stiles,” she says. Stiles raises his eyebrows to show he’s listening as he chews. “You have some bids on your house if you’d like to go over them later.”

Lydia chokes a little and Scott drops his fork. Stiles swallows slowly, cheeks flushing. And Allison has made a mistake, she can already feel the tension swelling…

“Yeah, fine,” Stiles says, looking down.

“What do you mean?” Scott asks, tone full of hurt and accusations.

“I’m selling my house.”

The ensuing argument isn’t as bad as it could be, but Allison’s phone _actually_ feels heavier and the stone in her stomach is more of a boulder now and those emails get even more impossible to answer as she watches it unfold.

Allison doesn’t find her voice until after Scott’s hasty retreat. “I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have brought it up, I should have just told you in private.”

“It’s fine. Just sell it, I don’t care.” And then Stiles _shuts down_.

Great.

Allison locks her phone and sets it face-down next to her plate. Picks up her fork. Shoves her food around half-heartedly. Even though she knows it’s the middle of the night back in LA, she wants to call her father. She wants to admit that she’s a little out of her depth. That she keeps making mistakes. Big ones, like not stressing the importance of contracts and shit, and small ones, like bringing up real estate when she should know it’ll just upset the fragile peace.

She doesn’t want to seem like she’s running away from the table and the conflict, so she stays until Danny, Jackson and Greenberg leave to head over to the venue.

She heads straight for Scott. Because she’s not going to call her father and Stiles probably won’t talk for awhile and Scott had looked so hurt…

“Hey,” he says in a soft, gruff voice when he opens the door and lets her in.

“I’m sorry.”

He shrugs, smiles a sad half-smile. “You didn’t do anything.”

“Don’t be mad at him,” she sort of begs.

“I’m not.”

“Then what? What’s wrong?”

Scott presses his mouth into a straight line and he takes a deep breath through his nose and lets it out again before answering. “It just feels sort of final, doesn’t it?”

Allison shakes her head even though… yeah. It kind of does.

“He’s just going to throw everything away for Derek, isn’t he?” Scott asks. “Even after… everything.”

Allison had promised Stiles she wouldn’t tell any of them this but… “The house has been on the market since the end of the summer tour. This doesn’t really have anything to do with Derek.”

Scott paces a little and nods a lot, deep in thought. He starts chewing on the side of his thumb, sort of curling into himself. Allison doesn’t know what to say. This is a prime example of her not knowing what to do when confronted with that delicate professional/personal line.

“He said he wanted to buy a place in Beacon Hills months ago,” Scott finally says. “I just didn’t think he was going to leave LA to do that.”

“It’s not like he’s moving out of state or anything…”

Scott doesn’t stop moving, but she can see a stuttering pause pass through him. He nods and nods and nods. “Why’s he going?” he asks, but the question sounds more like "Why is he leaving me?"

“Ask him.”

He stops nodding to shake his head. He stops walking to sit on the edge of his bed.

She understands where this is coming from in a distant, impersonal way. She never had a relationship quite like that of Scott and Stiles. She has Kira, but Kira had always been in New York. She had a handful of others, but they weren’t really that close to her. And she's had this band and the crew. The thought twists in her and stings. She feels like she’s always had this band. She can hardly remember what it was like before she had them anymore. She’s watched them grow up and she feels like she’s sort of grown up with them too. The longer she watches Scott, the sadder she feels…

“I’ll be sending him listings soon. I still want him to keep his mind open about Los Angeles,” Allison says. “So… no need to panic.”

“I’m not panicking,” Scott scoffs, coming back to life a little. He rubs his hand over his face and into his hair. “I’m sorry, I’ll apologize to him… Didn’t mean to flip out, but… yeah.” His lips curve in the approximation of a smile but it doesn’t reach his eyes.

**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oct 18  
> Morning after Oslo (where Scott made Derek sing with Stiles and Stiles was mad)
> 
> Oct 20  
> The night Stiles ends up in the hospital
> 
> Oct 23  
> After Stiles punched a dude! And then the morning after.
> 
> Oct 28  
> Only important Play Crack detail is that Erica had just had a conversation with Stiles about his feelings for Derek. Meaning Erica knows way too much ;)
> 
> Nov 1  
> After the Halloween party with their French friends, La Bete! Also, note how narrowly Derek missed being caught in Stiles' room and how narrowly Scott and Stiles missed getting caught by Derek! Hijinks!
> 
> Nov 5  
> Pretty straight forward. Day after Stiles and Derek doin' the do in the club.


	3. Part 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now it's time for the (not so) thrilling conclusion!
> 
> Anyway, you guys are really awesome as usual. I love you very much! Thank you for reading. :3
> 
> Come play with me on [tumblr](http://http://wearethecyclones.tumblr.com/) if you aren't already. ♥
> 
> Play Crack guide, if you will, at the end.

**November 6th, 2016  
Warsaw, Poland**

Scott doesn’t want to hear the rest of what Allison has to say, so he leaves. He leaves before that swooping sense of dread in his gut can reach up through his throat and bubble out of his mouth in the form of _hatred_. Cursing and blaming and a whole bunch of other things he’d regret if he said out loud. He leaves the conference room and blindly walks through winding halls until he gets outside. He doesn’t stop until he’s standing outside of his bunk screaming into his pillow on the empty bus.

Isaac’s done. They drove him away. They slammed a door in his face and he wasn’t even on the other side of it anymore and Scott even hadn’t stopped hoping he was.

It felt too right having Derek back so it was hard to keep him in mind and that’s… horrible. It’s neglectful and uncaring and fucking awful. Scott wants to call him now and beg him not to leave, but it’s final. And he’s not feeling strong enough to be told all the ways he failed as a friend.

He crawls into his bunk and pulls the curtain closed and lies there in the semi-dark. He tries not to let his mind wander in all the directions it wants to, but he can’t help it. 

First he’d failed Stiles. He let him spin out of control until he crash-landed in a hospital bed. He’d had to hold his head in his shaking hands while he waited for the ambulance.

Then he’d failed Isaac. He let him quietly fade into the background until he was gone. He had yelled at him in that practice room back in LA about being an asshole for “taking a break” but he had never tried to convince him to come back from that break.

Isaac was like a brother to him. He was one of his best friends. Groomsman at his wedding material. He’d been there for Scott when Stiles couldn’t be. He’d been there for Scott _about_ Stiles. He’d been there for all of them. Isaac had confided in him during long drives when everyone else was asleep but them. He’d told him about his mom not being around and his shitty dad and his brother going away to war and never coming home. Scott knew the depth to which his abandonment issues went. And he had let him slip away. 

Derek had left years ago and was only back as a favor. Isaac left. Stiles was moving away. Scott, at one point, had wanted a break so badly he thought he’d be okay just being done. Lydia kept her mouth shut about what she wanted, but Scott can only imagine the things she’d rather be doing… the things she had wanted to do in the first place, back when college acceptances were starting to flood her mailbox…

His band is done, wasn’t it? 

The press is going to think so.

Scott doesn’t want it to be over. 

What will he do if it’s over? 

Scott had wanted to be a veterinarian once. He worked in a vet’s office throughout high school and he was kind of great at it. And he loved it. Sometimes it hurt a lot, but he could handle it. It was worth it. He’d grown up wanting to be a nurse like his mom, or a doctor even. He would have been pre-med in college while he sorted out which he wanted to do. He would be applying for med school now if he’d taken that path. 

But that was before. He couldn’t go back to that, not now that he knows how it feels to be on stage every night. Not now that he makes a living doing the thing he loves the most. Not now that he’s seen the world several times over and still wants to see more of it. 

So what will he do if it’s over?

The question bounces around in his head along with everything else and he feels… discordant. Hollow. Messy. Horrified.

**

**November 7th, 2016  
Vienna, Austria**

Allison’s leaning against the wall opposite of the bathroom, fighting with everything in her to keep from nodding off. She listens to the hiss of the shower on the other side of the door and can’t help but picture water and soap suds slipping down Scott’s toned chest and abs. The image makes her smile.

The rest of the band is already asleep on the bus. Royales is watching a movie in the back lounge. The crew is still breaking down the stage and loading the trucks. Last she saw of Boyd and Marcus, they were asleep in the green room. Team Broken Bus is tuckered out. Team Everyone Else is just fine.

The shower turns off and Allison stands up straighter. After awhile, the door opens. Scott’s damp hair is already curling, he looks just as exhausted as everyone else and he smells amazing.

“Hey,” he says, adjusting his bag on his shoulder. “This feels very high school. Hot girl waiting outside the locker room for her hot jock boyfriend…”

“Oh, is that something that happened to you?” she asks, sarcastic.

He smirks. “Nah.”

“And did you say boyfriend?”

He shakes his head. “Didn’t mean it that way…”

She rolls her eyes and ducks forward to hug him. 

“What’s this for?” he asks, hugging her back. His body is warm and solid and she could fall asleep standing here probably. “Ally?”

“It’s just been a really exhausting, dramatic, tear filled few days and I wanted to hug you.”

He squeezes her and kisses the side of her head. “You’re cute.”

“You’re a good guy, Scott.”

“Hardly.”

:You’re great, shut up.”

She feels him shake his head. “It’s an illusion. I just have people who really love me. Makes me seem better than I am,” he says with a fond tone. 

The giant heart-to-heart in the wee hours of the morning had concluded with a lot of crying and hugging, something Allison would let them chalk up to exhaustion even though she knew better. As a result, there’d been a sense of tranquility to the day that she hadn’t sensed for a long time. 

“It’s going to be okay.”

She feels him nod. 

She pulls away finally, distantly aware that their bus call is fast approaching. 

“Hang in there for me, okay?” she asks. He looks more serious than she expected he would when she finally takes him in. He nods. He gets it, she knows he does. Because she’s kind of too tired and too terrified to ask him to keep the band going, but “hang in there” she can do. And he gets it.

“Anything for you,” he says softly, his hand rising to grasp her elbow. She grabs his forearm and smiles. 

She pulls away totally after awhile of just staring at each other and starts off down the hall with Scott right after her. She wants to say more but has no idea what or how to say it. She’s just full of a general sense of… dread. With a little bit of hope in there.

“We have a week left, anything can happen,” Scott says right before they get on the bus.

She stops and turns to look at him. He shrugs. “A lot has happened on this tour. A lot of good and necessary things. So. Who knows?”

“And what do you want?” she asks.

He shrugs again. “I want what’s best for us. All of us.”

“That’s all I want too.”

He nods. “I know.”

**

**November 8th, 2016  
Milan, Italy**

“Where are we with this no sex thing because…?” Allison asks, breathless when she pulls her face away from Scott. She’s perched on his lap, her hands splayed across his chest. Her lips (now curling into a hopeful smile) are swollen and wet, her curls out of order.

“I don’t know, I’m having a pretty good time.” He tightens his grip on her thighs and pulls her closer, making her breath hitch in her throat.

“C’mon,” she whines, grinding against him. “We could be having a better time.”

Scott slips down further against the headboard, taking her with him. She lets out a frustrated little sound when she finds herself tottering above him, thighs still tight around his hips. He slides a hand under the hem of her shirt – his shirt, actually, but she’s wearing it – and follows the curve of her side up to her waist. He brushes a thumb over her lowest rib and watches her shudder.

“Scott,” she says, trying to sound admonishing but dissolving into giggles instead. 

“Allison?” he responds innocently.

“I hate you.”

“No you don’t,” Scott argues, pinching her side to make her squirm. She falls against his chest and playfully bites his collar bone. “You so totally don’t.”

“You’re giving me blue balls, man,” she says, shoving one leg between Scott’s and rolling her hips as if to demonstrate.

“I’m giving _you_ blue balls? You’re giving me blue balls!”

“You’re the one holding out!” Allison arranges her face into a very comical pout. Scott hooks a leg around her and flips them both so he can hover over her.

“Allison Argent, when we finally do the deed, I am going to rock your world so completely and romantically that you will never ever want to even look at anyone other than me. I need proper preparation and timing and setting and I will settle for nothing less.”

He’s sort of caught in her eyes by the end of his proclamation. He sees the grin in them before it even hits her lips. She’s all long eyelashes and sparkling eyes and dimples. His entire world narrows down to her as a focal point. 

She hooks an elbow around his neck and pulls him down into an incredibly meaningful kiss. “I’m sort of already there,” she says when she slides her mouth away. “So how about a preview?”

Scott feels warm and pleased in response. And the idea of touching her with the intent to take her apart, make her shake and moan… is way too alluring to pass up. He kisses her like he means it and she spreads her legs underneath him. Scott’s hand travels down her body, settling on the worn cotton that covers her hip – she’s wearing his boxers… to match his shirt. 

“You like me?” he asks, stupidly. His hand hesitates on the waistband. She nods enthusiastically. When his fingertips touch the warm skin over her stomach, she giggles and squirms. “Would you like me still if I just tickled you?”

“No,” she says, moving lightning fast to still his hand. 

“Ticklish? You’re seriously ticklish?”

“Shut up,” she laughs. 

He yanks his hand away from her to trace the barest touch up and down the outside of her thigh. “Ticklish here?”

“Scott, I swear…”

He moves his hand over her bent knee, pushing slightly for her to bend it even further. “Here?”

“I’m going to kick you.”

He kisses her cheek and drags his hand around to the inside of her knee and heads up the inside of her thigh. He feels the second her breath gets shallower. “How about here?” he asks, hesitating just below the leg opening of the boxers.

“Scott,” she pleads, voice gone all breathy. She clings to him. He pulls his hand away from her thigh and she makes a pained sound. 

“Want me to tell you what I want to do with you?” he asks her, propping himself up so he’s barely putting any weight on her. She’s practically panting, arching her hips up into him and he knows she can feel that he’s just as worked up as she is.

“God, yes.” 

**

**November 9th, 2016  
Rome, Italy**

Allison wasn’t talking to him. Or any of them. Scott had stood outside her bunk, his hand on the back of her neck while she cried up until she pulled the curtain closed between them. And then she was off with Royales. And now that they were all together, she was walking through Rome next to Derek and not saying anything to anyone. So Scott walks with Erica, the least surly but less boisterous option out of the people present.

“How’s Allison?” he asks.

“She’s tired.”

“But other than that… was she…? Okay?”

“Lover’s spat, McCall?”

“Whoa, no, what? We just had a tough morning. I mean, we as in… the band and her. Not like me and her. Where’d… what do you know?”

“Nothing, nothing. Just a joke,” she backtracks. “She’s fine, it’ll be okay. Hey, look at _that_ fountain.”

Scott reluctantly accepts her subject change and they end up trying to out-trivia each other through the rest of their walk.

Stiles and Derek lean against each other in the elevator up to the suite afterward. Scott’s happy for them. They’re all soft smiles and stolen glances like it’s brand new, and it sort of is. Scott’s a little jealous too. And not _just_ because Allison hasn’t said a word to him all day. Though that’s part of it. 

**

**November 10th, 2016  
Rome, Italy**

“Isn’t it like… really late over there?” Kira asks upon answering, her face curious. Allison had logged onto Skype on the slimmest chance that Kira would be on, and here she is.

Allison squints at the time (it’s after 2am, everyone else is asleep) and nods. “I just need to talk to you…” she trails off when she tries to figure out where Kira even is. “Is that… is that your office?” 

Kira grins and nods enthusiastically. “Yeah. Closed on it a few days ago. Look!” She picks up her laptop and the scene spins for a second before it settles on a vast wall of windows looking out over the bay. “Isn’t it amazing?” Kira asks from off-screen. 

“Wow, Kira…” Allison breathes, mostly speechless. It’s cloudy outside the windows and the sun is starting to dip over the Pacific, painting the sky in a ridiculous array of colors. Kira moves and the rest of the open-floor plan space is revealed as she narrates. Poured concrete floor, exposed bricks, exposed metal rafters and pipes and things. It’s all very beautiful, actually. 

“We’re looking at contractors now to put up some sort of walls so we can have a conference room or something, I don’t know. What’s great is if we grow, we can probably buy out more of the building. But isn’t this brick great? We could probably eventually build our own studio in here or something. I’m meeting with some people my mom introduced me to just to talk about what to do with all of this but… I’m excited.” She says the last part as she turns the laptop back to so her face is on screen again. “Isn’t it great?”

“It’s beautiful,” Allison says, voice catching in her throat a little. She sniffs and shakes her head, rubbing at her eyes. God, she’s tired. She’s tired and upset and she’s so mad at herself for feeling… excited. Not just for Kira, but for herself. As if she’ll be involved in this whole endeavor. 

“What’s wrong?” Kira asks, voice concerned. Allison pulls her hands away from her face and is met with Kira’s most intense “talk to me” face.

“I’m losing this band and there’s nothing I can do to save it,” she blurts out.

Kira frowns. “No, I doubt that… what’s going on?”

So Allison tells her everything. Literally everything. From Stiles and Derek’s breakup and Stiles’ OD up through now and by the end of it she’s curled up under the hotel duvet with a pounding headache from all the crying. 

“Wow…” Kira says after a good minute of Allison just breathing with her eyes closed.

“Yeah.”

“Sounds like they don’t even know how to say they want to keep going.”

“I’m sorry, what?” Allison asks, sitting up so her laptop slides off her stomach and to the side. She pulls it into her lap and glares at Kira.

“I mean, it sounds like they’ve been through a lot, sure. But it also sounds like… I don’t know, they don’t seem like the types to… go through that and just… run away from it. You know? And they’ve been doing better? And Poland seems like it was good for them to just get it all out. That’s a good thing! That’s like a total reset point, you should capitalize on that.” 

“But they won’t talk about this. They’ll talk about everything, but not their actual career.”

“Make them.”

“I have _tried_.”

“Keep trying!”

“I’m going to die of a stress-related condition before I’m 30, Kira.”

“I won’t let you.” Kira sticks her tongue out and Allison shakes her head. Kira shakes her head back and in a sing-song voice says:“I want your band.”

Allison scrunches up her face to try to discourage the sting of tears that popped back up at that. “I can’t promise that they’ll even be a band anymore after this, honestly.”

“Remember how I said I wasn’t ready to even pitch to them yet in Vegas?” 

Allison nods, humoring her.

“Well, I’m sort of ready. Put my name in their ears and let them think it over. You know what I stand for, you know I’d do _anything_ to have a band like Smokes as my flagship artist, I now know everything about them and still want them. So just work with that. See what happens.”

Allison sighs deeply. “I thought you were afraid of them.”

She holds her hands up and gestures frantically. “I am. But after the Great Finals Week Meltdown of 2010, we agreed that only one of us could freak out at a time.”

She finds herself smiling. “I’ll bring it up. I make no promises.”

“That’s all I ask.”

“And if I lose my band, can I just come intern for you? That office is amazing.”

“You still have Royales, but sure. You’ll be my number one coffee fetcher.”

She laughs. “I can manage them and keep you caffeinated, no problem.”

“Good. Oh, and please fill me in on all the details when you finally seal the deal with that guitarist of yours.” She caps it off with a truly wicked, self-satisfied smirk. Allison had hoped that detail had slipped under the radar amongst everything else. She shouldn’t have been so naïve.

“Shut up.”

“The fact that he’s holding out on you is probably the least rock and roll thing I’ve ever heard, but it’s very cute.” Allison rolls her eyes and hides a smile against her fist.

**

Allison hides the bags under her eyes behind sunglasses and haughtily ignores the teasing about wearing them inside. She looked puffy from crying and she’s stayed up way too late with Kira.

She’s watching the boys toss around the Nerf football when her phone rings. She digs it out of her pocket and startles to see that it’s her father. It’s too early, or too late, in LA for him to be calling her for no reason.

“Dad?” she asks, answering as she rushes out of the room.

“Hey,” he starts, sounding weary. 

“What’s wrong?”

“We found out how the Isaac leak happened…”

Allison had followed the paper trail as far as she could but being abroad severely limited her reach. She’d gotten emails back from a couple of the earlier sources who report the news and all they had said was that they’d received an anonymous tip. 

“Okay,” Allison says slowly when she realizes she’s been silent for too long. She’s getting her thoughts in line, ready to check the truth against her suspicions: Isaac himself, one of Isaac’s friends, a scorned intern, a fake that happened to be accidentally right…

“It was Brunski.”

“Wha…?” Allison says dumbly, mouth falling open mid-word. Her poking around hadn’t veered in that direction, but it should have… “How’d you find out?”

“Marin Morrell. She got the tip a month ago and refused to release it because it wasn’t a reliable source. I know for a fact that the label relies on her for hype and gives her tips all the time. They were adamant about not revealing themselves this time around, meaning it wasn’t coming from marketing. Morrell got suspicious and used all her resources to trace the email back to him.” 

“Shit.”

“She got him to admit to it saying by saying she wouldn’t run a story on the label sabotaging their artists if he fessed up.”

Allison scoffs, impressed even though she feels like she’s spinning out of control. Fuck. She wishes she didn’t know what this would mean to the band. She wishes she didn’t know what this would look like or what the reaction would be. This was a total violation of trust. This was underhanded and dirty. This wasn’t something they would look at as business people who understood that shitty things had to be done sometimes, they would look at this as exactly what it was: betrayal. 

And it was. It was unethical. It was… deplorable. Allison’s skin was crawling in response to it.

“They did it so we’d scramble to disprove the rumors of a breakup, didn’t they?” Allison asks, more to organize the thoughts into words before she had to face them.

Her father murmurs in an almost proud way before he confirms it. 

“Dad…” she says, knowing how broken she sounds. She knows just how weak she sounds. She hates admitting defeat, especially to her father, but what else can she do? She’s fucked. This is the final nail in a coffin for a band that has been screaming and pounding against the lid every step of the way…

“You can handle this, Ally,” he says with confidence. “You’re a smart business woman, you’ve got a good clear head on your shoulders. You’ve made it this far, you can do it.”

“Dad,” she repeats, eyes stinging. She feels tiny and helpless. Like the little girl who got in a fight with Kira on the first night of summer camp and wanted to come home. 

“Talk to your band, call me after to tell me how it goes. I don’t care how long it takes, I’ll be up.” He says it in his fatherly voice, not in his boss voice. He says it like the father who convinced Allison to stick it out because she’d have way more fun at camp than stuck on a tour bus with him or sitting on set with her mom all summer. 

“Okay,” she concedes, feeling a little braver than before. 

She has to tell them about this. She has to see if she can bring up Vulpine Lupine. She has to just… ask them. She has to bite the bullet and ask them to keep going.

**

**November 11th, 2016  
Barcelona, Spain**

“Hey,” Allison says when Scott pulls his door open. The suite’s living room is dark with everyone already tucked away in their beds.

He feels like he’s been awake for days. Everyone else had slept on the plane, but he and Stiles spent the flight from Rome talking. He wanted to sleep so badly he almost wanted to cry, but Allison looked soft and uncertain in a way he hardly ever saw. Sleep could wait.

“Hi,” he says, reaching out until his hand falls on her hip. 

It feels so instinctual to just touch her… he’s missed her for what feels like days. It hasn’t been that long since they’ve talked, but it feels like it. It feels like they’d aged years in the last few stressful days. She shifts forward and Scott takes it as a cue to pull her into a hug and then into his room, shutting the door softly.

“Can I stay with you?” she asks, curling her hands into the soft cotton of his shirt.

“Yeah,” Scott mumbles into her hair. “Missed you.”

“Missed you too.”

He maneuvers them until he can sit on the bed, pulling her in between his legs so he can drape his arms around her waist and look up at her. She settles her arms on his shoulders and smiles a sad smile at him.

“It’s going to be okay,” Scott tells her. “It really is.”

“Sure,” she says dismissively.

“No. It is. I mean, I don’t know how but it will be.” She just nods. He wants to prove it to her somehow. He’d talked to Stiles about him moving away and all that and he honestly felt better about it. And he felt better about his friendship with Stiles in general. And he felt better about Derek. And he felt better about all of them. Together. As a band. He just doesn’t know how to express it.

“Promise?” she asks softly.

“Promise.” 

She sighs and pulls away from him entirely to crawl into bed. He takes the movement as an invitation and slips under the covers next to her. Their bodies curl together sort of perfectly. Her skin is soft and warm and he’s amazed at how she’s made… he’s fascinated with the fine bones in her hand and the curve of her lips… God, he’d missed her. He takes her chin in his hand and tilts her head up so he can kiss her. 

She kisses him back and hums contently. “I’m sorry,” she murmurs against his lips. 

“For what?” he asks, moving his head so she can tuck herself away under his chin.

She shrugs. “For not being around.”

“You’ve been around…”

“I mean, not like this.” She intertwines her fingers with his and brings his hand up to her mouth. Scott smiles when she pressed a kiss to his knuckles. 

“It’s okay.”

She shakes her head. “I want to be around for this.”

“Then be here.”

“I meant what I said,” she mumbles. “In Milan. I’m… there. With you. Still. Even with the last few days being shitty…”

Scott presses his cheek against her hair and lets his eyes slip shut. “Shh, I’m there with you too.” 

She lets out a sleepy “good” and falls asleep at the end of a content sigh that warms the back of Scott’s hand. 

**

**November 13th, 2016  
Madrid, Spain**

Scott’s sitting alone in the loading dock, his legs hanging off the edge. And he’s sort of… adrift.

He’d called his mom in Barcelona after a full day of letting the idea of a new label marinate in his head. He had told her about it and how promising it seemed and how the band had talked about a lot of their issues and how Derek and Stiles were definitely back together in some capacity and how much fun the shows had been.

She’d asked him what he wanted to come of it. He stammered and said, “Oh, I don’t know.” She hummed mockingly at him and changed the subject, knowing that was all she was going to get out of him.

He didn’t need to tell her what he wanted, she already knew. 

Madrid feels like the last stop on a tour before a nice vacation, not like the last show ever. He doesn’t want it to be. It won’t be. He knows that deep down. Even if they end up agreeing on a break, a lengthy hiatus, whatever… it won’t be indefinite. He has faith in that.

He’d just rather hear that the others are on the same page _now_ rather than in six months, or however long it takes them to realize they miss it.

The sound of footsteps shakes him from his thoughts and he turns to watch Allison slowly approach. She looks serious and deep in thought, but her lips quirk in a tiny smile when she sees him looking.

“Hey,” Scott says. He twists his body towards her and pulls one leg up onto the concrete. 

Allison nods her greeting. She lowers herself to the ground next to Scott and shoves her hands in her coat pockets. 

“Good news,” Allison says softly.

“Hm?” Scott prompts.

“I just booked Royales’ first national headlining tour.”

He grins at that. It’s the best thing he’s heard all day. “Holy shit…”

“Right?” She grins back at him, eyes meeting his for the first time since she’s sat. “I just… wow, it’s going to be so fun.”

The tour. Right. Of course she’ll be going with them. He feels his grin falter and he can’t even isolate the exact reason it does but… Her grin slips too, eyes sparkling as they kill up with tears.

“Don’t,” Scott starts, unsure of what else to finish that with.

“I am… so….” She laughs and looks in the opposite direction, curling against herself. 

“Excited. You are so excited and happy. And proud!” Scott finishes for her.

She nods. “It’s going to be my first tour without you guys. And it’ll be the first after my last—“ She stops abruptly and starts shaking her head instead.

“We’re not done,” Scott says. It’s the first time he’s said that out loud. He doesn’t want to speak for everyone else, but they don’t feel done. Lydia doesn’t seem done. Stiles doesn’t seem done. Derek doesn’t seem done. Scott knows for a fact that he isn’t.

“Maybe not,” she concedes. She holds her hand up to her face for a second, breathes, and turns back to him. “Anything can happen.”

“Yeah, it can.”

She smiles again. Scott reaches an arm out to haul her in for a hug. “Congratulations,” he says, squeezing her. 

“Hey, they’re the ones who did all the leg work.”

“You helped.”

“So did you,” Allison argues. 

Scott remembers when they announced Royales as their opener and most of the fans’ reactions to them had been, “Who?” And he remembers how nervous they had been that the crowd would hate them on the first night of tour. And he remembers them staggering off stage, shell-shocked, after the outrageously warm response they had received.

“Well then, congratulations to everyone,” Scott says. “Are you going to tell them in front of everyone like you did for us?” he asks when he pulls away from the hug.

“Yeah, during pictures.” She smiles and there’s an edge of mischief to it. “You know how I feel about reaction pictures.” 

There’s a very blurry, chaotic picture of Smokes under a giant dogpile after they’d been told they booked a headlining tour hanging somewhere in Allison’s office. 

“Well then let’s go, I can’t keep this secret for too long,” Scott says, standing. He offers his hand to Allison and drags her up and into his arms. “Wait, when you’re on tour without me, can I be your groupie?” 

She laughs, nods enthusiastically, and pulls him into a kiss.

**

Allison texted Scott from her room and didn’t even have to wait a full minute for him to arrive.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, closing the door behind him and leaning against it. She can hear loud music and loud conversation outside, but inside is quiet. Two different kinds of celebrations going at once.

“Literally nothing. Nothing at all,” Allison says, walking up to him, putting her hands on his neck. He meets her in the kiss easily. 

He wraps his arms around her and she pushes him back against the door, smiling into the kiss. 

“Happy End of Tour,” she says.

“Yeah!” Scott agrees, too tongue-tied to say anything else.

“Happy Smokes Is Gonna Make It Day,” she continues, starting to pull him back toward the bed. “Happy Scott and Stiles Didn’t Kill Each Other Day. Happy Coming Out Day for Derek and Stiles.” Her legs hit the edge of the bed and she stops. Scott laughs, his hands sliding to her hips. She kisses him again. “Happy Allison and Scott in a Hotel Room Day…”

“Oh, that’s my favorite holiday,” Scott says, letting Allison drag him down onto the bed, onto her. 

He braces himself with his hands on both sides of her, smiling down. Allison slides her hands up his shirt tentatively. 

“Mine too,” she says, dragging him back into a long kiss.

“Hm,” Scott murmurs afterward, hooking his fingers in her waistband. “This would be good timing.”

“It would be,” she agrees eagerly.

“And the setting? Madrid? Not too bad.”

She bites her lip to keep from grinning.

**

**March, 2017  
San Francisco, CA**

In the few minutes of silence after Derek’s slammed out of the room, Stiles simmers and mutters to himself as he flips furiously through a notebook. Lydia throws her drumsticks at the padded wall and falls face-first onto the couch. And Scott’s contemplating ducking out for a snack break just in case this meltdown lasts as long as the one a few days ago…

The door pushes open with a sucking sound and closes heavily. “Why is Derek walking away from the studio?” Allison asks, concerned. She’s balancing a cup carrier full of coffees and her own drink in the other hand.

“You’re in town?” Scott asks, voice going warmer than he meant it to.

“Surprise,” she says, smiling.

He wants to get up and hug her and kiss her and drag her off for more, but he forces himself to stay put. It’s been a solid month since he’s seen her in person, and even that had just been because she was in town for the day with Royales and Isaac. There had been too many people around to really catch up like they’d wanted.

“Can I get some help here?” she asks. Stiles tosses the notebook down and stands in a rigid motion, going to her. “What a gentleman,” she mumbles when he snatches the drink carrier from her and sets it down roughly. He turns back around and kisses her on the cheek before skulking back to his spot. “That’s better. Kind of. So, why was Derek walking away?”

“Because he and Stiles just spent half an hour arguing over something stupid,” Lydia says from the couch. She reaches her hand out and makes a grabby motion. Allison puts a coffee cup in her grip and sits in the sliver of space Lydia’s not taking up. Lydia sits up and curls around her a little, smilng for the first time in awhile. “I missed you, you’re not crazy and you smell better than all of them combined.”

Allison laughs, closing her hands over Lydia’s. “I don’t know, Scott smells alright sometimes.”

Stiles makes a sound, drawing Scott’s attention to him, and his head snaps up to look between them. He stares Scott down, still chewing on his pen, and Scott feels nervous. “Wait a second…” Stiles mutters, but he’s cut off when the door opens.

Derek shoulders his way in, a pink box in one arm. He drops it on the table next to the coffee and walks toward Stiles. Stiles looks up at him with a furrowed brow.

“Donuts. You’re a cranky asshole when you’re hungry,” Derek snaps.

“And you’re a cranky asshole all the fucking time,” Stiles snaps back. Derek puts his hands on Stiles’ shoulders and bends down to kiss him. 

Scott rolls his eyes, Lydia groans, Allison _giggles_. 

“Hi, Allison,” Derek says when he pulls away and stands straight up. Stiles puts his hands on Derek’s hips and seems more relaxed already. 

“Hey. I brought coffee. Do you actually have anything recorded or have you guys just been fighting?”

“We’re almost done,” Scott tells her, grinning.

“Already?” she asks in disbelief, looking between all of them. 

“Yeah,” Stiles says. He glares at Derek. Derek glares back.

“Oh! So this is a minor detail argument, not like something massive?” she asks, brightening. She almost shakes with excitement.

“Minor detail,” Stiles says, batting the air dismissively. “Are you two dating?”

Scott has no idea what his face does, but it’s probably something very close to what Allison’s face does: eyes wide, mouth open.

“Oh, that makes so much sense!” Stiles exclaims, settled. He stands and moves Derek out of his way just enough so he can get around him to the donuts. 

“I can’t believe neither of you told me!” Lydia exclaims, letting go of Allison to sit up and pout.

Derek just nods his approval.

Scott’s still too blind-sided to speak. Sure, Stiles knew there was _someone_ , he had for awhile, but he never pestered Scott about it. Except for the good hour they had spent sitting out on the porch while Stiles guessed every single guy they’d ever so much as talked to because, “I just don’t see why you’d keep a girl secret from us.” Scott had wanted to tell him then, just to get it over with, but he didn’t want to start a fight. 

“You guys aren’t mad?” Scott finally asks.

“No?” Stiles answers around a mouthful of donut. 

“I’m mad you didn’t tell me,” Lydia huffs, but there’s no weight to it.

Derek rolls his eyes and scoffs. 

“This uh, doesn’t change anything, I’m still…” Allison stammers.

“You’re still a professional blah blah, we know,” Lydia supplies for her. “I like it when Scott’s not slutting around, so good for you.”

“Lydia!” Scott half-yells, blushing. Allison looks up at him and smiles her glowy smile and he relaxes. 

Thankfully they don’t dwell on it for long. (Scott almost feels let down, as if this should have been a bigger deal.) They get back to working through the song, avoid all arguments, and wrap it up early to go get dinner with Ally.

Scott’s allowed to touch her in front of them. He’s allowed to kiss her on the cheek. And that’s sort of amazing. They get teased by everyone, and that’s amazing. When they leave the restaurant and put Allison in a cab to her hotel, Stiles nudges at him to go with her.

“You’re really not mad?” Scott asks, seconds before bowing to the temptation. Allison’s watching with an amused smirk and quirked eyebrow from the backseat of the cab.

“She’s the only person alive who is actually too good for you, but if you make her happy… then I guess that’s good enough for me,” Stiles says. Derek pinches his side and shoots him a look. Stiles elbows him and laughs. “You two are probably the best people I know, you deserve each other,” he amends. “Now go, have fun.” 

Stiles shoves him toward the cab and Scott stumbles a little. He rears back and tugs Stiles into a hug.

“Aw, bring it in,” Stiles mumbles, squeezing him. “Love you too, buddy.”

“Yeah yeah, bring me clean clothes in the morning.” Scott taps him on the ass before pulling away and grinning at him over his shoulder.

“Derek, he’s getting fresh with me!” Stiles complains, laughter in his voice, right before Scott closes the car door.

Allison holds his hand and leans her head on his shoulder all the way to the hotel and Scott’s phone won’t stop buzzing with text messages full of lewd messages and gifs from the band.

“This was an unexpected side-effect of telling them,” Allison says, laughing at a long series of Lydia and Stiles sending ugly selfies (and the occasional picture of Derek looking disapproving). 

“I expected more yelling and less of this,” Scott says, scrolling through a text that is nothing but hundreds of little wedding chapel emojis.

“Well,” Allison says, her free hand closing over Scott’s phone and pulling it away from him. She holds down the lock button and swipes to power it down. “This is the lovely, beautiful new Smokes for Harris future, and we’re just living in it.” 

“I’ll take it.” He turns his head and smiles into her hair. 

“Me too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nov 6  
> After finding out Isaac left.
> 
> Nov 7  
> After the show, the day after their giant bus blow out.
> 
> Nov 8  
> Same night as Stiles and Derek's super intense night. 
> 
> Nov 9  
> After Allison briefs them on the bus and sort of loses it. :C
> 
> Nov 10  
> In the wee weee hours. Allison freaking out with Kira! And then her finding out how the Isaac information leaked, before she first tells the band about Vulpine Lupine.
> 
> Nov 11  
> This is them at the hotel the same night as the Rome show (with the Feeling This cover!), after Scott and Stiles talked about moving at the airport.
> 
> Nov 13  
> Before the last show... and then after the last show. ;) FIRST TIME SEX HERE, I just couldn't make it work because I suck sry :C
> 
> March!  
> During the recording of Annuals.
> 
> (((I HOPE THIS DOESN'T FEEL AS ANTI-CLIMACTIC AS I FEEL IT IS?? I feel so naked without a playlist for it too... Who am I even??)))


End file.
